I LIBRARY OF CONGRESS.} 



| jmJ& | 



I UNITED STATES OP AMERICA, f 



1 

I 



REASONS, &c. 



REASONS 

FOR 

ATTACHMENT AND CONFORMITY 

TO THE 

CHURCH OF ENGLAND. 

-ft^Jf BY 

THE REV. R. MEEK, A.M., 

RECTOR OF ST. MICHAEL'S, StfTTON BONNINGTON, NOTTS. 

ftfjttfc iEtntton, 

REVISED, CORRECTED;, AND ENLARGED. 



LONDON: 
J. HATCHARD & SON, 187, PICCADILLY* 
DEARDEN, NOTTINGHAM, 

1846. 




Nottingham : 
Printed by William DeardeD, Carlton Street. 



PEE FACE 

TO THE FIRST EDITION. 



In submitting the following pages to the Public, the 
Author redeems a pledge which be gave, of stating the 
reasons of that decided avowal, which a sense of duty 
constrained him to make, of his preference of the com- 
munion and ministry of the Established Church. 

He is not ashamed to acknowledge, that for several 
years he discharged the arduous aDd responsible duties 
of pastor of several respectable dissenting congregations. 
He takes this opportunity of gratefully acknowledging 
the candour with which his ministry was received, as 
also the kindness and respect he experienced among 
them. He feels peculiar pleasure in this way of ex- 
pressing his gratitude to several respectable dissenting 
ministers, for the handsome manner in which they 
voluntarily bore testimony to his character and motives 
at the time when he resigned his ministerial connexion 
with them. 

It is satisfactory to the Author to know, that he has 
vindicated the motives by which he was influenced, by 
the sacrifices he has made. 

It is not uncommon to hear those, who have the cou- 
rage to avow, and act according to a change in their 
opinions, charged with fickleness and a want of principle. 
On this point the following remarks of a respectable 
writer deserve attention. 

" That cannot be a right rule of judgment, which 
would universally make the notions acquired in early 
life, resulting quite as often from accident and prejudice, 
as from judicious intellectual culture, the standard of 



iv 



PREFACE. 



action through the whole course of human existence.'' 
Adverting to the change which takes place in the 
opinions and connexions of seme persons, this respect- 
able writer remarks : " Of all such occasions it is highly 
desirable that our judgment should be regulated by the 
suggestions of liberality and candour, and that we 
should not blame merely because an individual has 
quitted the party to which we might have attached 
ourselves ; recollecting that the party he joins may be 
fully as much inclined to commend as we are to blame ; 
and that if either the censure or the commendation be 
directed to the mere change, without having endeavoured 
to ascertain, and free from prejudice to appreciate, the 
real motives which effected it, they who indulge in such 
hastily formed sentences of commendation or acquittal, 
may be more culpable than the persons whose conduct 
they undertake to judge. 

" It ought also to be recollected, that though the 
decisive step which marks the ultimate issue in a change 
of sentiments, may by its suddenness excite surprise and 
enkindle doubts among those who know nothing of the 
mental or conscientious process which has really been 
going on ; it may notwithstanding have been conducted 
with the utmost circumspection, the successive steps may 
have been taken with the most laudable deliberation, 
often, too, accompanied by very painful struggles at the 
disruption of old associations, which prejudice, affection, 
and time, may have alike contributed to strengthen. 
i Each mind/ says one of our most profound moral 
writers, ' possesses in its interior mansions, a solemn 
retired apartment peculiarly its own, into which none 
but himself and the divinity can enter. In this retired 
place the passions mingle and fluctuate in unknown 
agitations. When the man comes forth from his retire- 
ment, to render palpable to the world the result of his 
converse with himself, and it may be with his God, 
must we of necessity censure, because the course of his 
proceedings is different from what it formerly w as ?'' 

If in the following statement of his convictions and 
feelings respecting the Established Church, the Author 



PREFACE. 



V 



has permitted any expression to escape him, which may 
be considered as indicating an hostile feeling towards 
dissenters, he takes this opportunity of disavowing any 
such intention or feeling. His remarks apply not to 
individuals, but to dissent as a system, which he has long 
felt to be practically defective, and as tending to contra- 
vene the Redeemer's prayer for the unity of his church. 
(John xvii. 20, 21.) 

f. The Author expects to be told that he has overlooked 
what is so loudly condemned as abuses and defects in 
the Church of England. In reply to this, he observes, 
that there is no section of the visible church of God in 
which defects and abuses are not to be found ; that those 
charged against the Church of England are not inherent 
in her, but accidental to her ; that as she is pure in doc- 
trine and primitive in government, those defects which 
do not prevent her enjoying the abundant blessing of her 
God, which at present she so largely experiences, furnish 
no just reasons for separation from her communion, 
With such convictions the Author ventures to deprecate 
the well-meant, though mistaken zeal of some of her 
clergy, who in their pious anxiety for reformation, by 
publishing to the world what they consider her abuses, 
have furnished weapons for a more powerful attack on 
the church ; and thereby given cause for the church to 
complain, " These are the wounds with which I was 
wounded in the house of my friends ! " 



e 2 



PREFACE 

TO THE SECOND EDITION, 



In sending forth the Second Edition of this work, the 
Author desires, with devout gratitude to God, to acknow- 
ledge the distinguished acceptance, and the great 
success, with which it has heen favoured, In stating 
his firm and honest convictions of the excellence of the 
Church of England, he cherished the hope that he might 
be the honoured instrument of conciliating towards her 
the regards of those to whom Christian unity is precious, 
and who mourn over those divisions which are the 
reproach of the church of Christ. It has been his privi- 
lege to realize success in this way, far beyond his most 
sanguine expectations, as letters, not only from ministers 
of the established church, but also from dissenting 
ministers, from various parts of the kingdom, have 
assured him. Several of the latter have acknowledged 
to the Author, that the perusal of the work has convinced 
them that their former objections against the established 
church are untenable. This fact is mentioned, not 
boastingly, but from a conviction, that it supplies no 
trifling argument in favour of the scriptural character 
and excellence of the Church of England; and especially 
so, at a time when that Church is held up by some 
leading dissenters to the hatred and opposition of the 



Vlll 



PREFACE. 



nation, as anti-christian in character, the subversion of 
which is necessary to the triumph of truth and godliness 
in the land. 

It is singular, that at the time when the novel discovery 
has been made, of the anti- christian character and influ- 
ence of the established church, there should be many 
dissenting ministers of long approved piety, talents, and 
usefulness, who are desirous of conformity to her com- 
muniou, and of admission to her ministry ! The Author 
could mention names, but it would not be safe to the 
individuals to whom he alludes to do so, as in all proba- 
bility it would subject them to the hostility of those who 
would consider a desire to conform to the Church of 
England as an unpardonable sin. 

It is an inconsistency, to use the mildest term, which 
can only be accounted for by a knowledge of the incon- 
sistency of human nature ; that they who propose it as a 
fundamental principle of their system, that every indi- 
vidual has the right of judging for himself, and of follow- 
ing the dictates of his own conscience in religious matters, 
should be the most prominent in impugning the exercise 
of that right in others. A minister of the establishment, 
as now and then happens, may join the ranks of dis- 
senters ; his secession from the church is proclaimed as 
the triumph of -principle and of conscience ! But let a 
dissenting minister conform to the establishment; — his 
previous and acknowledged character of piety and use- 
fulness will avail him nothing with the party he has 
quitted — however beloved by them before, he is instantly 
denounced as wanting in mental and moral qualifica- 
tions ! Such conduct is iu consistent with the funda- 
mental principle of dissent — it betrays the absence of 
Christian charity — it is the effervescence of spleen and 
intolerance. 

The loud and bitter outcry against the Church of 
England on the score of tests and subscriptions to which 
her clergy, and members of her universities, are required 
to submit, comes with a very ill grace from those who 
demand of their own ministers, as necessary to the full 
enjoyment of the privileges of their body, submission to 



PREFACE, 



ix 



tests which they have enjoined. A melancholy proof of 
this has recently been exhibited in a vote of the Con- 
gregational Board. By this vote, certain dissenting 
ministers are excluded from membership, and from the 
privileges of that body ; for the crime, not of immorality 
of conduct — that could not be alledged ; not for holding 
false doctrine — that could not have been the objection; 
for Socinians who deny the Godhead of the Saviour, are 
recognized by these members of the Congregational 
Board, in the Redcross- street Union, as brethren ! — Will 
the reader believe it, that the great offence of these 
pious ministers, which subjected them to the excommu- 
nicating edict of the Congregational Board, is, that in 

THEIR CHAPELS THEY USE THE LITURGY OF THE CHURCH 
OF ENGLAND ! 

"We think," says the Editor of the Record, " this de- 
cision of the Congregational Board ought to be promul- 
gated to the world, in order that the public may know 
what is the measure of liberality, toleration, and charity, 
to be expected from those who are most clamorous for 
the redress of their alledged grievances, and the most 
clamorous advocates of liberality, toleration, and 
charity. Here is a body of professedly Christian 
ministers, who deem it lawful and even necessary, to 
fraternize with Socinian teachers in their meetings in 
Redcross- street ; who consider it no dereliction of duty 
to recognize such heretics as Christian ministers, and to 
unite with them for the advance of their sectarian 
designs. And yet this same body, so liberal, so chari- 
table, so tolerant towards the enemies of their Lord, 
spurn from them, as if they dreaded some moral con- 
tamination, those of their own brethren, who are guilty 
of no other offence, than the use of the beautiful and 
scriptural form of the Established Church ! We think 
that the decision should be made known in Parliament, 
that members may understand the feelings and princi- 
ples of those who are now seeking admission to the 
universities. For the grievance inflicted by this excom- 
municating edict, is of greater importance than might 
be supposed, The great argument for the Redcross- 



X 



PREFACE. 



street union is based on the political advantages derived 
from the fact, that the three denominations are the only 
dissenters recognized by his Majesty, and as such, 
allowed to approach the throne. — In common with other 
dissenters, the congregationalists complain of their ex- 
clusion from the universities on account of their refusing 
to subscribe the Thirty-nine Articles. But they them- 
selves exclude their own brethren from all participations in 
their rights and privileges for a very minor difference, fyc." 

It is singular, that while Dissenters acknowledge, that 
there never was a time in which the Church enjoyed so 
largely the blessing of God, possessed so many pious and 
efficient ministers, or exerted a more holy influence on 
society at large, they should hold up the religious esta- 
blishment of this country as a great national evil, and an 
obstacle to the progress of truth and godliness ! There 
is a want of Christian and candid feeling in the way in 
which they endeavour to evade the force of the argument, 
which the delightful fact mentioned, supplies in favour 
of the established church. " It will perhaps be replied," 
says Mr. James, " that if systems are to be tried by their 
practical effect as regards religion, is not the present 
increase of piety in the established church an evidence 
of its being approved of God, and adapted to promote 
the religion of the country ? It is undoubtedly a proof 
that God has raised up a great number of holy and 
faithful men in that communion, for some great purpose 
of mercy towards the nation which they are blessing with 
their labours, and towards the church which they may 
be the means of reforming by their intelligent piety ; 
but it would not be so easy to prove that this state of 
things is the result of the alliance between church and 
state: it is a distinguished blessing, not arising out of the 
system, but superinduced in mercy upon it." 

How lamentable is the influence of prejudice ! It is 
confessed that God is remarkably blessing the Church 
of England, and rendering her a great blessing to the 
nation ; and yet it is queried, whether all this is evidence 
of its being approved by God, and adapted to promote 
the religion of the country ! What then, according to 



PREFACE. 



XI 



this mode of arguing, can be regarded by any 
church as evidence of divine approbation? Is it 
in accordance with the divine procedure, or the divine 
holiness, thus remarkably to smile upon a system, which 
its opponents represent as positively sinful, and an 
obstacle to the progress of truth and godliness in the 
land? 

Fearful indeed, then, is the responsibility of that indi- 
vidual who would excite and nurture in the minds of 
any, prejudice and hostility against a church which God 
sanctions so eminently by his blessing. There are, 
whom the delightful fact referred to, is attracting 
toward the church ; they say, " We will go with you, for 
we perceive that God is with you." "No," says Mr. 
James, 66 attend regularly upon the preaching of ministers 
of your own denomination. Suffer not the truly delightful 
increase of spiritual religion in the Church of England to 
diminish your conviction of the importance of your princi- 
ples. We may embrace, and ought to embrace, all 
opportunities to mingle with pious church people in the 
operations of benevolence, and the intercourse of society: 
the more we do this the better, as it tends to soften the 
asperity of discordant sentiment, and to maintain the 
communion of saints, in the parlour (!) and the 
committee room ( ! ) &c" " Oh ! tell it not in Gath, 
publish it not in the streets of Askelon, lest the Philistines 
rejoice, lest the uncircumcised triumph that a minister 
of that Saviour who prayed that all his people might be 
" one" should thus labour to narrow the communion of 
saints, and only sanction, in this instance, the enjoyment 
of it to a few who have access to the parlour and the 
committee -room ! 

In the present edition the Author has treated on some 
points which were omitted in the former. He has in- 
troduced additional extracts from dissenting publica- 
tions as illustrating the influence of dissent. He has 
done this not with hostile feelings towards those who 
are identified with the system, but from a supreme regard 
to the cause of truth and unity. In the course he has 
felt it his duty to pursue, he expects to be branded by 



Xll 



PREFACE. 



some as a bigot and an enemy. To both of these charges 
he pleads " not guilty." With his firm and conscientious 
conviction of the excellence of the Church of England, 
he hopes ever to cherish Christian affection towards " all 
those who love our Lord Jesus Christ, in sincerity and 
in truth." 

Rectory t Brixton Deverilly 

near Warminster, Wilts , May, 1834. 



CONTENTS. 



Preface to the First Edition iii 
Preface to the Second Edition vii 

PART I. 

REASONS FOR ATTACHMENT TO THE 
ESTABLISHED CHURCH. 



CHAPTER I. 

Page 

The Expediency, Lawfulness, and Advantages of a 
Religious Establishment ..... 1 

CHAPTER II 
Episcopacy . 25 

CHAPTER III. 
The Claims of the Church of England . . .47 

CHAPTER IV. 
The Lawfulness or Unlawfulness of Separation 
from the Established Church considered . . 73 



ii 



CONTENTS. 



PART II. 

POPULAR OBJECTIONS TO THE CHURCH OF 
ENGLAND CONSIDERED. 



CHAPTER I. 

Page 

Liturgical Forms . . . . , .95 

CHAPTER n. 
The Baptismal Service 105 

CHAPTER III. 
Absolution — Visitation of the Sick — Burial Service 
— Sacrament of the Lord's Supper . , . 125 

CHAPTER IV. 
Power Claimed and Recognized by the Church. 144 

CHAPTER V. 
The Evils of Separation, an Argument for Christian 
Union 164 



Appendix 191 



REASONS, 



PART I. 

REASONS FOR ATTACHMENT AND CONFORMITY TO THE 
CHURCH OF ENGLAND. 



CHAPTER L 

The expediency, lawfulness, and advantages of 
a National Religious Establishment, 

In an "Address to the Protestant Dissenters of 
England and Wales, by the Committee of the De- 
puties from the several congregations of Protestant 
Dissenters of the three denominations, &c. in pur- 
suance of the resolution of the general meetings 
held llth July, 1828/' the merits of the question 
now to be considered are thus stated :— " The 
churchman considers an establishment important, 
if not necessary to the maintenance of religion, and 
the dissenter regards such an institution as incon- 
sistent with the spirit of Christianity, and detri- 
mental to its interests."* Since that time a more 

* " While the churchman considers an establishment 
important, if not necessary to the maintenance of re- 
B 



2 



unequivocal expression of the views and feelings of 
Dissenters in reference to the Church of England, 
has been given. The Rev. Mr. Binney, in an 
appendix to his address delivered on laying the first 
stone of his new meeting-house, says, " It is with 
me, I confess, a matter of deep,- serious, religious 
conviction that the established Church is a great 
national evil ; that it is an obstacle to the progress 
of truth and godliness in the land; that it de- 
stroys more soids than it saves; and that there- 
fore its end is most devoutly to be wished by every 
lover of God and man !" The writer of a tract 
published by the Society for promoting Ecclesias- 
tical Knowledge, thus expresses the opinion of 
Dissenters : — " It is their opinion, that all eccle- 
siastical establishments are anti-christian in prin- 
ciple, and, on the whole, anti-evangelical in their 
results; irrespective of majorities in their favour or 
opposed to their existence. They conscientiously 
believe, that civil magistrates have no more right 
to establish and enforce Christianity by human 
laws, than to make Judaism, Popery, or the dog- 
mas of Mahomet, the creed of the country, and 
that a continuance of the hierarchy involves our 
rulers in the guilt of usurping the prerogatives , 
and nullifying the plans of Jehovah. They think 
themselves, though even considered to be a mino- 

ligion, and the dissenter regards such an institution as 
inconsistent with the spirit of Christianity and detri- 
mental to its interests, there must, between parties 
holding such contrary opinions, be, not (we may now 
hope) a hostile, or even on the whole an unfriendly, but 
an avowed and continued opposition," Address. 



3 



rity, absolutely bound, by their allegiance to 
Christ and concern for the purity of his cause, to 
employ their talents, influence and constitutional 
powers, not merely for the removal of grievances 
pressing peculiarly on their own respective com- 
munion, but also for annihilating all secular domi- 
nation in the affairs of the Gospel. To profess 
and attempt less than this, would be an impeach- 
ment of (heir religious fealty, a compromise of 
their principles, and a dereliction of long acknow- 
ledged obligations.* 

* No. 51. Library of Ecclesiastical Knowledge, p. 
275, 276. It would be easy to multiply extracts of a 
similar character from tracts and pamphlets lately 
published by Dissenters. Those issued by the Society 
of Ecclesiastical Knowledge, are avowedly designed to 
rouse the indignation of their readers against the church 
establishment of this country, — it would not be easy to 
name a series of publications which betrays more of 
what is anti- christian in spirit, or of intolerance towards 
Christians who differ from them. It is marvellously in- 
consistent in Dissenters who claim the right of choosing 
and adopting that form of church polity for themselves, 
which they consider most agreeable with the word of 
God, to deny that right to others, and to calumniate 
their Christian brethren who differ from them ; and to 
make common cause with the enemies of religion and 
protestantism, to seek the downfall of a church, which 
the writer most firmly believes, is u built upon the 
foundation of the prophets and apostles, Jesus Christ him- 
self being the chief corner stone." If any thing be 
necessary to add to the feeling of astonishment and 
regret which such intolerance and inconsistency excites, 
it is the time selected for this manifestation of hostility 
against the established church. Mr. James, in his 
address to his people on the principles of dissent says, 
" Not that I mean to say, the churches which have been 



4 



Considered in this light, the question at issue 
assumes a character of immense importance. If 
on the one hand the churchman regards a national 
religious establishment " important, if not neces- 
sary to the maintenance of religion," then it is en- 
titled to his sincere attachment and most zealous 
support. If, on the other hand, by the Dissenter, 
as is now unequivocally avowed, such an institu- 
tion is considered to be inconsistent with the spirit 
of Christianity — an obstacle to the progress of 
truth and godliness in the land, and destructive to 
souls — then have we a reason for his separation 
from, and hostility to, the Church of England. 

allied to the state, have never done any good. Our own, 
(the Church of England,) for instance, has done an im- 
mense service to the cause of religion, both by its vast 
theological literature, and by its evangelical ministers : 
and never was it more useful in the latter respect than it 
is at this moment. You who dwell in this town (Bir- 
mingham) have only to look to the multitudes who 
crowd our churches, and to mention the justly venerated 
names of their ministers, to be convinced that the 
Church is dispensing benefits which will make myriads 
through eternity, both happy and grateful!" What Mr. 
J. says of the usefulness of the church in Birmingham, 
will apply to other places. And yet this is the time, 
when God is so greatly blessing the church and making 
her a blessing to the nation — that Dissenters, at least an 
influential portion of that body, claiming to be the most 
orthodox and most zealous for God's glory, avow their 
intention of seeking to overthrow the Church as an 
establishment, and proclaim her " a great national evil 
— an obstacle to the progress of truth and godliness in the 
land," and as that which " destroys more souls than it 
saves ! ! !" 



5 



The writer offers to the consideration of the can- 
did inquirer the following reasons, which have 
satisfied his own mind, as to the expediency, law- 
fulness, and advantage of the religious establish- 
ment of this country. 

An able writer on political economy, argues 
against religious establishments, on the ground, 
that the article of religious instruction should be 
left to the pure operation of demand and supply, 
like any article of ordinary merchandize. The 
fallacy of this position is thus ably exposed by 
Dr. Chalmers : — " He seems to have overlooked 
one most material circumstance of distinction. The 
native and untaught propensities of the human 
constitution will always, of themselves, secure a 
demand for the commodities of trade, sufficiently 
effective to bring forward a supply equal to the 
real needs of the population and to their power of 
purchasing. But the appetite for religious in- 
struction is neither so strong, nor so universal, as 
to secure such an effective demand for it. Had the 
people been left in this matter to themselves, there 
would, in point of fact, have been large tracts of 
country without a place of worship and without a 
minister. The legislature have met the population 
half way, by providing them with a church and a 
religious teacher, in every little district of the 
land ; and by this arrangement have increased, to 
a very great degree, the quantity of attendance, and 
the quantity of actual ministration. In point of fact, 
a much greater number of people do come to church, 
and do come within the application of Christian in- 
fluence,, when the church and the preacher are pro- 
d 2 



6 



vicled for them, than if they had been left to build a 
meeting-house, and to maintain a preacher them* 
selves. There is a far surer and more abundant 
supply of this wholesome influence dealt out among 
the population, under the former arrangement, than 
under the latter one : and it is this excess of moral 
religious good, which forms the only argument for a 
national establishment, that I shall now insist upon," 

The argument so forcibly stated in this extract, 
appears to decide the necessity and expediency of 
a religious establishment. 

The argument derives additional force from the 
acknowledged necessity and importance of religi- 
ous principle to the prosperity and stability of a 
state. Even Plutarch, the Pagan, says, " a city 
seems to me more capable of being built without a 
foundation, than a polity is capable of receiving a 
system, or having received one, of preserving it, if 
sentiments of religion be entirely removed." 
'AXXa ttoKIq av fioi Sokel edatyovg yupiQ, fj 7ro\tTEia 
tt)q TTEpt 6eu)v do^rj^ avaipr)daiarr)g wavra Tract, crvar- 
tolglv Xafieiv, i] Ad/3?/cra T7]prj(rai. Higher autho- 
rity than Plutarch affirms, u Righteousness exalteth 
a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people." 
Our own age furnishes us with the solitary instance, 
in which the awful experiment has been made of 
attempting to govern a mighty empire, without an 
external and authorised form of religion. The ex- 
periment was made by revolutionary France. Athe- 
ism and infidelity, enjoying a temporary triumph, 
trampled beneath their feet the altar and the throne. 
The fearful consequences need not here be told — 
history records them, as a i earful warning to the 



7 



world, that no nation, however refined or powerful, 
can exist without the recognition, and pervading 
influence of religion . It may be truly affirmed, 
that Christianity is " the strongest and sweetest 
cement of society." 

This being admitted, it would appear that a le- 
gislative establishment of religion, with the view of 
securing religious instruction to the population of 
the country, is neither " inconsistent with the spirit 
of Christianity/' nor "detrimental to its interests," 
but it is in reality in accordance with its spirit, and 
adapted to promote its interests. 

If there be, as the writer believes there is, any force 
of truth in the above conclusions, it becomes the 
imperative duty of the supreme magistrate, of the 
legislature of a nation, to make such a provision as 
that contended for, by a legislative establishment 
of religion. The very same reasons which would 
render it the duty of the head of a family to esta- 
blish a certain order of religious instruction in his 
family, render it equally expedient and imperative 
in the governors of a state to establish religion in 
the state over which they preside, and the true in- 
terests of which they thus more effectually advance. 
It is not a little singular that Dr. Owen, the oppo- 
nent of episcopacy, and champion of independency 
viewed the matter in the same light. In a sermon, 
" On the power of the civil magistrate about the 
things of the worship of God," he thus addressed 
the Long Parliament — " If," says he, "it once 
comes to this, that you shall say you have nothing 
to do with religion as rulers of the nation, God 
will quickly manifest that he hath nothing to do 



8 



with you as rulers of the nation. Certainly it is 
incumbent on you to take care, that the faith which 
was once delivered to the saints, in all the neces- 
sary concernments of it, may be protected, pre- 
served, propagated, to and amongst the people 
over whom God hath set you. If a father, as a 
father, is bound to do what answers this in his own 
family unto his children — a master, as a master to 
his servants: if you will justify yourselves as 
fathers or rulers of your country, you will find in 
your account this to be incumbent on you." 

The necessity and expediency of a national es- 
tablishment of religion such as we possess in this 
country, will further appear by an appeal to facts. 
Assuming that the calculation is correct, which 
states the number of parishes in England at ten 
thousand, what would at this time have been the 
moral condition, of a very large proportion of these 
parochial districts, without that provision for reli- 
gious instruction secured to them by the established 
Church ? It is not too much to affirm that moral 
darkness would have covered the land, and gross 
ignorance the people. By a statement published 
in a dissenting periodical, the number of places of 
religious worship in England are : — of Episcopal 
churches and chapels, nine thousand nine hundred 
and eighty three ; of dissenting congregations of 
every Protestant denomination, six thousand four 
hundred and twenty-two. * According to this 

* The particulars of this statement are given at the 
end of this Chapter, and were made in 1829 ; since which 
there has been a vast increase in the number of churches 
and chapels belonging to the established Church. 



9 



statement, there appears to be an excess of congre- 
gations of the Established Church, above those of 
dissenters of all denominations, amounting to three 
thousand five hundred and sixty-one. In the 
above calculation, there are no returns of episcopal 
places of worship from the dioceses of Bristol and 
Rochester , which would have made the numerical 
superiority of congregations of the Established 
Church much greater. 

In the statement of the number of dissenting 
congregations, it will be found that they exist in 
greater numbers in mining and manufacturing dis- 
tricts ; where the population is more scattered, dis- 
senting congregations are not so numerous. That 
dissenting congregations should be so numerous in 
the more populous towns and districts, is in a great 
measure to be attributed to the want of church ac- 
commodation, the increase of which has not kept 
pace with the increase of population, or extended 
with the population, in the districts referred to. 
The activity and zeal of dissenters have, in such 
cases, successfully multiplied congregations — this 
has especially been the case with the Wesleyan 
Methodists. In the returns of dissenting places 
of worship, it will be found by a reference to 
Cornwall, Yorkshire, and other parts of the king- 
dom, many small and unimportant places have 
been returned as regular and established congre- 
gations, while they are in fact small places in con- 
nexion with established congregations, without 
settled pastors, and merely supplied, occasionally, 
by lay and itinerant preachers. The various, and 
varying opinions which separate some classes of 



10 



Dissenters from others ; and the frequent divisions 
which take place in their societies, leading to the 
erection of new and rival places of worship, must 
not be lost sight of in this calculation. The mul- 
tiplication of places of worship from such causes, 
is rather a proof of the weakness, than of the 
strength of dissent. It is also necessary to remark, 
in this list of dissenting places of worship, are in- 
cluded the numerous Arian and Socinian congrega- 
tions, by whom all that is fundamental and essen- 
tial in Christianity is denied and rejected. When 
these facts are considered, the numerical superiority 
of episcopal places of worship must be greater 
than at first appears from the statement which has 
been made. If the above calculation, which coming 
from the source which has been stated, cannot be 
questioned, presents us with the true results of dis- 
senting zeal and benevolence, up to the present 
day, how extensive and awful had teen the dearth 
of religious instruction and influence in this 
county, but for the Established Church ! This 
appeal to the facts of the case, is not now made to 
vindicate the advantages of the Established Church, 
so much as it is to vindicate its necessity and ex- 
pediency. It is much to be feared that those who 
exclaim most loudly against an Established Church 
overlook this view of the subject, which demands 
their serious and candid attention. 

It is not, however, merely on the ground of 
expediency, that the religious establishment of our 
country is now attempted to be vindicated. Mere 
expediency will not justify what in itself is un- 
lawful. If it be true, as is asserted, that such an 



11 



establishment is " contrary to the spirit of 
Christianity, and detrimental to its interests" no 
expediency whatever can authorize it, or entitle it 
to the respect and support of Christians. In 
pleading for an establishment, its advocates must 
take higher ground. 

It can hardly be necessary to prove that it is a 
duty and therefore lawful, and enjoined by God, 
that every head of a family should provide for, and 
establish, a certain order of religious instruction in 
his family. The same reasons which determine 
what is duty and therefore lawful, in this smaller 
community, equally decide as to its being the duty 
and therefore lawful, on the part of a king or the 
legislature, to provide for and establish the means 
of religious instruction for that larger community, 
over the interests of which Providence has called 
them to preside. " It appears then, as has been 
remarked, to be a paramount duty to promote 
Christianity, in some form of it, to the utmost of 
our power, and that this obligation increases in 
proportion to the extent of our influence and au- 
thority ; so far, therefore, are kings from being 
released from this duty, that they, more than all 
others, are bound to exert themselves in propagating 
a religion, so essential to the happiness and good 
order of their subjects." The writer whose words 
have been quoted, adds, " Now this obligation 
appears necessarily to lead to the embodying of our 
religion with the affairs of the state, and to lay all 
Christian kings under a moral necessity to advance 
its real interests." In what other way Christian 
kings can perform this sacred duty, than by an 



12 



establishment* of religion in some certain form, 
agreeable with the word of God, it would be difficult 
to conceive.* 

The argument advanced receives additional con- 
firmation from the fact that God himself ordained 
a religious establishment for the Jewish nation, of 
the most minute and elaborate construction. 
Judaism was, by the divine appointment, the 
religion of the nation, and however some may 
object to the phrase, was in close alliance with the 
state. It will be replied to this, that the govern- 
ment of the Jews was a theocracy ; that in many 
respects it was peculiar to itself. Admitting all 
this, yet there is nothing in such a state of things 
opposed to the principle contended for. u If," it 
has justly been argued, " the principle of an 
establishment were unlawful, is it likely that such 
a precedent would have been supplied to us by Him 
who doeth all things well ? Tbis proof of the 
lawfulness of a national establishment of religion is 
strengthened by the approbation which God him- 
self bestowed on those pious kings and governors, 
who, under the Jewish dispensation, displayed 
most pious zeal in advancing the interests of 
religion among their subjects. " It may be ob- 
served, that several of these virtuous princes did not 
limit their exertions to the strict letter of the 
precept, but in many respects instituted religious 
observances, which were nowhere directly enjoined, 
and on account of which they were highly com- 
mended. One might instance the case of Josiah's 
reformation on finding a copy of the law, when he 
. * Appendix A. 



13 

appointed solemn fasts and sacrifices, such as had 
never before been witnessed in Israel, and on 
account of which the historian has given us the 
following honourable testimony : — e Like unto him 
was there no king before him, that turned to the 
Lord with all his heart, and with all his soul, and 
with all his might.' (2 Kings xxiii. 25.) The like 
may be seen in the case of Jehoshaphat ; (2 Chron* 
xvii.7— II;) ofHezekiah, (2Chron. xxxi, 20,21.) 
Now, will it be pretended that there was any thing 
so peculiar in the Jewish dispensation, as to render 
this zeal and exertion to promote the cause of re- 
ligion among their subjects, right in Josiah, Je- 
hoshaphat, and Hezekiah, and wrong if imitated 
by Christian princes ?" This is a point deserving 
the serious attention of those who exclaim against 
the interference of the civil magistrate in the re- 
ligious institutions of a nation, as in all cases in- 
fringing on the rights of God and conscience, and 
as inconsistent with the spirit, and detrimental to 
the interests, of Christianity. 

To such an establishment of religion by the 
state, and alliance of the church with the state, it 
is objected, that Christianity claimed and enjoyed 
no such alliance in days of apostolic purity ; that 
it is contrary to Christ's declaration, " My king- 
dom is not of this world that it has tended to 
the corruption of Christianity ; and that it has 
thus been abused to purposes of state policy, ty- 
ranny, and superstition, These are serious allega- 
tions: if they can legitimately be sustained, it is 
admitted that a strong case would be made out 
against religious establishments, 
c 



14 



That Christianity, in days of apostolic purity, 
was, in no state, a national and established religion, 
and that she preferred no direct claims to be re- 
ceived and respected as such, can be satisfactorily 
accounted for. At that time, the powers of the 
earth, both civil and religious, were combined 
against her, from a jealousy which is easily ex- 
plained. Christianity denounced, and aimed at 
the subversion of idolatry, which was most inti- 
mately allied with all the civil institutions of the 
age. It was her uncompromising spirit which 
raised against her the hatred and persecution of 
every existing government. Christianity could not, 
therefore, in the nature of things, prefer her just 
claims to such an establishment and alliance as that 
she now inherits, till idolatry, which then wielded 
against her the powers of the state, had been sub- 
dued and overthrown by her heavenly influence. 
To have asserted, at the commencement of her 
career, her claims to that, the recognition of which 
would be the natural result of her triumphs, would 
have given Christianity the appearance of a politi- 
cal rival, who wished to establish an imperium in 
imperio. There is nothing in all this which 
furnishes materials for an argument against such 
an establishment and alliance of Christianity as she 
afterwards, and now enjoys. We repeat, that this 
would be the natural consequence of the triumphs 
of the Christian religion. The truth and excellency 
of Christianity, and the reasons which have already 
been assigned for the expediency and necessity of 
making a provision for the religious instruction of 
their people, would suggest to the civil magistrates 



lo 



themselves, when converted to the Christian faith, 
the propriety of such an establishment and alliance 
of religion, as that contended for : and thus, in 
numerous instances, the institutions of men would 
become blended with the ordinances of Christ. 

The declaration of Christ, " My kingdom is not 
of this world," has been considered as furnishing an 
unanswerable objection against a legislative esta- 
blishment of, and alliance of, his religion with the 
state. Those who venture on such an inference 
from this declaration of our blessed Lord, overlook 
the reason and design of Christ in making it. 
The Jews well knew that the Roman governor 
could not take cognizance of a mere religious dis- 
pute : they therefore charge Christ with the design 
of setting up an authority and kingdom against 
Coesar ; this was the matter of their accusation. 
Pilate therefore puts the direct question to Christ, 
" Art thou a king ?" — demanding of him, by such 
an enquiry, whether he claimed to exercise author- 
ity as an independent ruler. Our Lord therefore 
replied, " My kingdom is not of this world." 
Christ, in effect, said, " I am indeed a king, but 
not in the sense in which you understand it, and in 
which I am accused. I aim at no earthly throne, 
or political sceptre ; I am no rival of Csesar. My 
kingdom is not of this world, but in heaven ; and 
the reign I seek is in the hearts of mankind." 
This answer satisfied Pilate, that our Lord had no 
such ambitious schemes of earthly domination as 
the Jews alleged against him ; and he candidly 
acknowledged, u I find no fault in him." It is 
difficult to imagine what there is in such a declara- 



16 



lion of our Lord's/ which forbids, or even discoun- 
tenances, such an establishment and alliance of 
religion as that now contended for On this point 
it has been well said, " It is not necessary to con- 
clude from this natural independence of the church 
on the civil powers, and her inherent competency 
to her own support, that she was for ever to remain 
in the same separate condition in which she was 
originally left by our Saviour and his apostles. 
When the rage of persecution had ceased, and the 
rulers of the world, themselves converted to the 
faith, evinced a disposition to protect and honour 
her, it would be difficult to have assigned any 
plausible reason for her absolutely refusing that 
protection, and despising that honour. So to have 
interpreted the declaration of Christ, that 'his 
kingdom was not of this world,' would have been 
consistent with nothing but the most senseless 
fanaticism, and in truth would very materially have 
impeded the extension of his kingdom among men. 
Though not of the world, it was at least in it, and 
established in it for its conversion and salvation : — 
objects far more likely to be obtained by concilia- 
tion and friendly intercourse than by maintaining 
the proud distance of continued separation. The 
prophetic intimations of her destined greatness were 
calculated to give her a far different impression of 
the course which it became her to pursue. She 
could not but anticipate the day when ' kings ' 
should be ' her nursing fathers/ and ' their queens' 
her nursing mothers ;' when ' the Gentiles ' should 
' come to her light,' and ' kings to the brightness 
of her rising.' And when the actual arrival of that 



auspicious era opened to her the prospect of 
establishing an harmonious union between the 
ordinances of man and the institutions of Christ, 
for their mutual and more effective sanction and 
support, she could scarcely have hesitated either as 
to the lawfulness or expediency of the projected 
alliance, fortified as she must have been by the 
recollection of that intimate union between the 
ecclesiastical and civil authorities, which had for 
ages existed in the Jewish state by the special ap- 
pointment of Heaven." 

It is objected against such an establishment of 
religion, that it tends to the corruption of Chris- 
tianity. In proof of this, it is urged, that the cor- 
ruptions of Christianity began with the establish- 
ment of the Christian religion by Constantine, the 
first Christian emperor. This objection assumes 
as fact, that which is not true. Those acquainted 
with church history, know that the corruptions of 
Christianity had made awful advances long before 
Constantine had embraced or established it, as the 
religion of the empire. The corruptions of Chris- 
tian doctrine and discipline alleged, are to be traced 
to the degeneracy of men themselves, and not to 
the mere circumstance of the patronage of the 
state being extended to the church. Of this, the 
corruption and departure from the faith, to be seen 
in numerous societies of a religious kind in this 
kingdom, who have long been separate from the 
Established Church, furnish abundant and lamen- 
table proof.* 



* Appendix B. 

c2 



IB 



It is further objected against the religious esta- 
blishment of the country, that its alliance with the 
state has rendered it a mere engine of the state ; 
that it has thus become subservient to state policy 
and tyranny. The great want of candour and 
justice so manifest in such an objection, hardly 
entitles it to a reply. Even assuming the allega- 
tion to be true, — does the abuse of any institution, 
excellent in itself, disprove the lawfulness of it ? 
Has not every sect, when possessed of power, 
proved as much, if not more, tyrannical and sub- 
servient to the existing authorities by which they 
have been patronised, as ever it is pretended 
the Church of England has been ? If the impar- 
tial records of the history of Independent and 
Presbyterian ascendancy be consulted, it will be 
found that the establishment has nothing to fear 
from the comparison. 

What has been advanced in favour of a religious 
establishment, from its expediency and lawfulness, 
is strengthened by a consideration of the advanta- 
ges resulting from such an institution. It is hoped 
that sufficient has been stated to show that a na- 
tional religious establishment " is not inconsistent 
with the spirit of Christianity." The next point 
to be proved, is, that such an institution is not 
" detrimental to its interests." 

An opportunity will present itself in a later stage 
of this discussion, of attempting, in a more parti- 
cular way, to show the utility of the Church of 
England. It is intended here generally to answer 
the inquiry, — has the legislative establishment of 
religion been advantageous, or detrimental to the 



19 



interests of Christianity ? The affinitive of 'this 
is contended for. 

At the time when the emperor Theodosius in- 
corporated Christianity with the state, and esta- 
blished it as the religion of the empire, a conside- 
rable part of the empire, notwithstanding the 
mighty triumphs of Christianity, remained Pagan 
and opposed to the Christian religion. Had Con- 
stantine and his successors, as Dean Milner ably 
argues, contented themselves with only encourag- 
ing Christianity; without a miracle or a succession 
of miracles, the greater part of the Roman world 
might have remained Pagan to this day ; at least, 
the reception of Christianity, the greatest blessing 
to the world, would have been postponed, espe- 
cially as those miraculous gifts to which it owed its 
widely-extended triumphs in its infancy, had ceased 
in the church.* If it be admitted, which few will 

* " Now, we think it is not by a fanciful, but a sound 
generalization, that w r e pass from the case of a home 
mission to that of an establishmemt — which is neither 
more nor less, in fact, than a universal home mission. 
At its first institution, in the reign of Constantine, the 
very work remained to be done which we have now sup - 
posed. Its proper object is not to extend Christianity 
into ulterior spaces, but thoroughly to fill up the space 
that had been already occupied. It is a far mightier 
achievment than may appear at first view, completely to 
overtake the length and breadth of a land. All the de- 
vices and movements of the many thousand missionaries 
who, during the first three centuries, lived and died in 
the cause, failed in their accomplishment. I beg you to 
recollect that fact, because it is one of capita,! importance 
in the argument for a religious establishment — that not- 
withstanding the high endowments, the political endow- 



20 



deny, that pure and undefiled religion, in the in- 
fluence which it exerts, is the best blessing and the 
surest safeguard of a state ; then must it follow that 

ments — notwithstanding the advantages of highly gifted 
men, and though bordering on the ages of inspiration — 
yet all the movements in the first three centuries did 
little more than plant Christianity in the cities of the 
Roman empire. And that is the reason why, the term 
" heathen" is synonymous with that of " Pagan" which 
signifies <• a countryman it was because the great ma- 
jority of the countrymen (those who lived in the country), 
were still in a state of heathenism. These men did 
much in the work of spreading the Gospel externally ; 
but they left much undone in the work of spreading it 
internally. They had christianized the thousands who 
lived in cities ; but the millions of Pagans, or the pea- 
santry, who were yet unconverted, evince the country to 
have been a great moral fastness, which, till opened up 
by an establishment, would remain impregnable. 

" Now, this very opening was presented to the minis- 
ters of Christ when the Roman emperor, whether by a 
movement of faith, or of philanthropy and patriotism, 
made territorial distribution of them over his kingdoms 
and provinces, and assigned a territorial revenue for the 
labours of this extensive vineyard; and so enabled each 
to set himself down in his own little vicinity, the fami- 
lies of which he could assemble to the exercise of Chris- 
tian piety on the Sabbath, and among whom he could 
expatiate through the week in all the offices of attention 
and Christian kindness. Such an offer, whether chris- 
tianly or politically made on the one side, must chris- 
tianly be accepted and rejoiced in by the other. It 
extended inconceivably the powers and the opportunities 
of usefulness ; audit brought the gospel of Jesus Christ into 
contact with millions more of imperishable spirits : and 
with as holy a fervour as ever gladdened the breast of the 
devoted missionary, when the means of an ampler service in 
the Redeemer's cause were put into his hands, might the 



21 



a legislative provision for the instruction of the 
people in the doctrines and precepts of this holy 
religion cannot fail to prove of the highest utility. 
From a statement already made, it has appeared 
how great would have been the religious destitution 
of the population of this couutry without such a 
provision, and on the contrary, to what a great ex- 
tent this has been rendered available. 

It is no small argument in proof of the utility 
of the Established Church, that it secures to the 
great mass of the population of the country the 
regular and abundant ministration of divine truth, 
which teaches all to " deny ungodliness and worldly 
lusts, to live soberly and righteously" and godly in 
this evil world " to honour all men ; to love the 
brotherhood ; to fear God and honour the king.'' 
It is not too much to assert, that to the influence 
of those large portions of religious truth which, by 
this provision for their instruction, are statedly 
brought to bear upon the great mass of our popu- 
lation, under God, we owe it that we are a Chris- 
tian nation ; and that we continued such at a time 
when, in consequence of the triumphs of infidelity, 
the very name and forms of Christianity were dis- 
carded in a neighbouring state. It was this which 
rendered our country the Thermopylae of the 
moral world at that fatal period. If, as is cheer- 
Church in these days have raised to heaven those orisons 
of purest gratitude, that kings at length had become its 
nursing fathers, and opened up to us the plentiful harvest 
of all their population."— Dr. Chalmers' Sermon on Religi- 
ous Establishments. Pulpit, No. 561. 



22 



fully conceded, those who have separated from the 
Established Church, have by their piety and zeal 
contributed to this state of religious advantages, in 
which, as a nation, we are so happily placed, they 
greatly owe their efficiency in this to the toleration 
and protection extended towards them by that es- 
tablishment from which they have dissented. 

That there should be found in such an establish- 
ment imperfections, yea even abuses, is not attemp- 
ted to be demed. Every thing in which man, an 
imperfect creature, is employed as an instrument, 
will indicate something of the imperfection of 
human nature. It would be well, if those who are 
so forward to condemn the Church of England on 
this account, would look into their own communions 
and remember the words of him who said, " Why 
beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, 
but considerest not the beam that is in thine own 
eye ?" To desire the destruction of the Church of 
England on the ground of real or supposed abuses, 
not inherent in her system, but accidental to it, and 
which prejudice is ever ready to magnify, would 
involve a principle, and establish a precedent, 
which would require and justify the overthrow of 
not only every religious society, but of every insti- 
tution, however excellent its nature, or beneficial its 
influence. However ungrateful the comparison, it 
cannot be withheld — that many deal by the Church 
of England, as the philosopher by the sun, when 
he wishes to discover some spots in his glorious 
disc ;— he first darkens his vision by shutting out 
the light, and then adding his magnifying powers, 
he is at length able to discover a few spots in the 



23 > 



sun. Thus prejudice acts in discovering the faults 
of our religious establishment : it first blinds the 
individual to her excellencies : it then magnifies 
her faults, and proclaims her an ti -christian, and 
detrimental to the interests of Christianity ! And 
this at a time when God is abundantly blessing the 
church ; reviving religion in her, and rendering 
her the most efficient instrument in extending the 
triumphs of true religion both at home and abroad ! 

Statement of the Number of Episcopalian and Dissenting 
Places of Religious TV orship, from the Congregational 
Magazine , as published in the Record, Dec, 14, ] 829. 

EPISCOPAL CHURCHES AND CHAPELS. 



Diocese. 




Diocese. 




Ely 


. 158 


Exeter 


. 707 


Chester 


. 606 


Durham 


. 203 


Carlisle 


. 130 


Gloucester . 


. 329 


Winchester . 


. 483 


Lichfield 


. 647 


Hereford 


. 378 


Bristol (no return) 




Canterbury . 


. 359 


Chichester . 


. 140 


Rochester (no return) 


Salisbury 


. 492 


Lincoln 


. J267 


Worcester . 


. 264 


Norwich 


. 1194 


York 


. 492 


Peterborough 


. 335 


London 


. 630 


Oxford 


. 228 






Bath and Wells 


. 491 


Total 


9,983 



Thus is produced the large total of Episcopal 
Congregations, including a great portion of the 
rank, wealth, and influence of the country. 

The Dissenting Congregations of every Protest- 
ant denomination (given in Counties) are as 
follow : — 

Bedfordshire . 70 Cambridgeshire . 84 
Berkshire . . 75 Cheshire . .146 

Buckinghamshire . 120 Cornwall . .318 



94 



Cumberland 


. 101 


Derbyshire . 


174 


Devonshire . 


. 238 


Dorsetshire 


. 81 


Durham 


. 163 


Essex 


168 


Gloucestershire 


. 172 


Hampshire . 


. 117 


Hertfordshire 


61 


Herefordshire 


45 


Huntingdonshire 


36 


Kent 


. 202 


Lancashire . 


. 423 


Leicestershire 


. 137 


Lincolnshire 


. 292 


Middlesex . 


. 268 


Monmouthshire 


. 68 


Norfolk 


. 173 



Northamptonshire . 


150 


Northumberland 


117 


Nottinghamshire . 


149 


Oxfordshire 


91 


Rutlandshire 


13 


Shropshire . 


96 


Somersetshire 


246 


Staffordshire 


192 


Suffolk 


128 


Surrey 


97 


Sussex 


81 


Warwickshire 


97 


Westmoreland 


39 


Wiltshire . 


126 


Worcestershire 


96 


Yorkshire . 


973 


Total 6,422 



CHAPTER II. 



Episcopacy- — the mode of Church Government 
established in the Church of England consi- 
dered. 

" If," says Chillingworth, " we abstract from 
episcopal government all accidentals, arid consider 
only what is essential and necessary to it, we 
shall find it no more than this — An appointment of 
one man of eminent sanctity and sufficiency to 
have the care of all the churches within a certain 
precinct or diocese, and furnishing him with au- 
thority, (not absolute or arbitrary, but regulated 
and bounded by laws, and moderated by joining 
to him a convenient number of assistants,) to the 
intent that all the churches under him may be 
provided of good and able pastors ; and that both 
of pastors and people, conformity to laws, and 
performance of their duties, may be required, under 
penalties not left to discretion, but by law ap- 
pointed." 

Conversing on this subject some time since with 
a late highly respectable and talented dissenting 
minister, he candidly admitted to the writer, his 
belief that the principles of each mode of church 



26 



government, of episcopacy, presbyterianism, and 
independency, are to be found in the New Testa- 
ment ; adding, u I am an episcopalian, but not of 
the Church of England, because her episcopacy is 
derived from the Church of Rome." Assuming 
for a moment, the correctness of the above admis- 
sion, that the principles of episcopacy, presbyte- 
rianism, and independency, are all to be found in 
the New Testament; the inquiry is, which of 
these modes of church government receives most 
support from the New Testament, from apostolic 
practice, and from its adoption by the church, 
nearest to the times of apostolic purity ? The 
assertion, that the episcopacy of the Church of 
England is derived from the Church of Rome, is 
one which, in the sense it was intended to convey, 
can be disproved. If the stream of episcopacy 
has, in its course clown to out times, flowed through 
the impure channel objected to, it can nevertheless 
be traced up to the New Testament, and apostolic 
days, as its source. We must not deny that it 
flows from a pure fountain, because it has, in its 
windings, occasionally run in an impure channel. 

Before we enter on the proof of this, a few pre- 
liminary observations are necessary. 

It is said by some, that no one particular mode 
of church government is prescribed in the New 
Testament, or was intended to be recognized by it ; 
but, on the contrary, that God designed that this 
should be left to time and circumstances, and 
the choice of those who embraced Christianity. 
That the mode of the government of the church, 
the unity of which is so often and solemnly enjoined 



27 



in the apostolic writings, should be left thus unde- 
fined and uncertain, is, to say the least, improbable 
and unreasonable. How could the unity of the 
church, so solemnly inculcated, on this supposition 
have been maintained? Is it not more reasonable 
to admit, that the great Founder of Christianity and 
his apostles, prescribed a certain order of govern- 
ment for the church, adherence to which would be 
most likely to secure the unity of the body ? See- 
ing God, when he established the Jewish church, 
framed so minutely the mode of its government, it 
would be a manifest anomaly not to suppose a simi- 
lar and adequate provision made for the Christian 
church ? If an apostle in smaller matters, exhorts, 
that " all things be done decently, and according to 
order,' 9 it would seem to follow, that in a matter of 
so much importance as the government of the 
church, men were not left to follow their own incli- 
nations. The command of the apostle just adverted 
to, {let all things be done decently, and according 
to order"* 1 Cor. xiv. 40.) supposes the existence 
of certain rules and laws in the church, by which 
alone order could be maintained, and Christian 
edification secured. It is most probable that the 
order and mode of government, which Christ 
prescribed for his church, were made known by him 
to his chosen apostles, in his converse with them, 
after his resurrection from the dead — " to whom he 
showed himself alive, being seen of them forty days, 
and speaking of the things per taming to the king- 
dom of God" — (Acts i. 3.) 

* TTavra — mra za\iv yiverrOu>. 



28 



To this it is objected, that the apostles them- 
selves nowhere prescribe this order of church 
government, and that it is extremely difficult to 
determine, from their writings, what that particular 
government was. The supposed silence of the 
apostles is accounted for from the fact, that in their 
days the particular mode of government enjoined 
and practised by them, was not disputed, unless the 
case of Diotrephes, who aspired to apostolic pre- 
eminence, be excepted. To this may be added 
other reasons why, in the writings of the apostles, 
there is not a full expose of the polity of the 
church. " It should be carefully recollected that 
the historical parts of the New Testament, besides 
being but a short abstract of the transactions which 
they record, refer, in general, to the primary con- 
version of disciples, and to a period when the 
church was too much in its infancy to admit of 
complete and permanent regulation : that the epis- 
tles were, for the most part, addressed to those who 
principally required instruction in the very rudi- 
ments of Christianity, and who, as yet perhaps, had 
no standing ministry ordained among them ; that 
even where the case was otherwise, the epistles being 
merely occasional, rather pre-suppose than explain 
the government of the church, which, while it still 
remained in the hands of the apostles themselves, 
could scarcely be either misconceived or disputed ; 
that in the ministrations to which St. Paul some- 
times alludes, the ordinary offices of the church are 
not always to be really distinguished from those 
extraordinary gifts of the Spirit, with which so 
many were then favoured \ and, finally, that most 



29 



of the apostles long survived the writing of the 
books of the New Testament, and may naturally be 
supposed to have proceeded by degrees to their full 
and final arrangements, as the increasing numbers 
and stability of the church enabled them." — " The 
question, therefore, to be decided, is not what the 
apostles did at the commencement of their ministry, 
but how they proceeded when their converts had 
become numerous, and capable of a regular govern- 
ment." 

A professed and full detail of this government, 
for reasons assigned, is not to be sought for in the 
writings of the apostles. The incidental informa- 
tion, however, which they supply — explained and 
illustrated as it is by the decided opinions and 
usages of the primitive ages of the church — will 
furnish us with the most decisive proof in favour of 
episcopacy, and justify us in claiming for that mode 
of church polity which characterises the Church of 
England, the high sanction of apostolic times. 

1. The incidental information afforded by the 
writings and practice of the apostles, appears to the 
writer decisive of episcopacy, or of that triple 
ministry of bishop, priest,* and deacon, which ob- 
tains in the Church of England, In the writings 
of the apostles, we meet with the terms, bishops, 
presbyters or elders, and deacons or ministers. 
(Acts xv. 22 ; xxi. 18; Phil. i. I ; James v. 14 ; 
1 Pet. v. 1—5, &c. &c.) It appears from the 

* The word priest is the English word for presbyter, 
(elder,) and is evidently a contraction of it. Our saxon 
ancestors pronounced the word more fully, preoster. 
D 2 



30 



evidence of the New Testament, that besides the 
apostles, who daring their lives, retained in their 
hands the chief government of the church, there 
were at least two orders of ministers, both inferior 
to the apostles, and receiving ordination and minis- 
terial authority from them. 

It has been contended that the office of bishop 
and elder is one and the same in the New Testa- 
ment ; and that these titles were appropriated to 
the same individual indifferently. An old and 
anonymous writer thus accounts for this apparent 
anomaly : — " While the apostles were in being, it 
is no wonder there was not that distinction as after- 
wards, for they were themselves the governors of 
the church, and so there was no need of bishops or 
any other. For during their planting the churches, 
they retained in their own hands what belonged 
properly to the episcopal office, and committed it 
not to any till they took their leave of those 
churches. So that upon this consideration, the 
very men were called presbyters (elders) while the 
apostles governed, who were afterwards called 
bishops, and had a further power. Neither is it a 
difficult matter to suppose how the names were 
promiscuously used, w r hile the episcopal office and 
dignity was thus held and included in the aposto- 
lical. But as the bishops, who were priests before, 
succeeded the apostles, and had a new addition of 
power and office devolved upon them, they laid 
aside by degrees the name of apostle, and took that 
of bishop in its stead ; and this they did out of 
modesty, as paving a mighty veneration to those 
whose call was extraordinary, as being sent imme- 



81 



diately by the ordinations of our blessed Lord 
himself, or by the wonderful mission of the Holy 
Spirit." 

That presbyters, or elders, are in some places 
addressed as bishops, or exhorted to do the work 
of bishops, as in Acts xx. 28, is accounted for, by 
the fact that at that time the apostles were mostly 
engaged in travelling from place to place, to plant 
new churches : these elders, therefore, as circum- 
stances required, acted as their representatives, in 
their name, and by their authority, To argue from 
the fact of their being thus occasionally called 
without distinction bishops and elders, that the 
office was one and the same, would be just as rea- 
sonable as to argue from the fact of some of the 
apostles calling themselves elders, ( i Pet. v. 1 ; 
2 John i ; 3 John 1,) that therefore all elders 
were apostles. 

Much stress has been laid on Phil. i. i, where 
the apostle St. Paul, addressing the officers of that 
church, mentions only " bishops and deacons it 
is contended from this, that these two were the only 
essential officers known in the primitive church. 
ee If," it is said, " there were elders in this church 
who were distinct from bishops, the omission of 
them is inexplicable. If elders be allowed to have 
been officers inferior to bishops, they were unques- 
tionably superior to deacons ; and it is incredible 
that this letter should not have been addressed to 
them also, when it was addressed to deacons." In 
reply to this we observe, in churches where at first 
converts were few, the apostles ordained only a 
bishop and one or more deacons in a city or dis- 



32 



trict, who were appointed to minister to those 
u who should afterwards believe through their 
word." When in those places converts multiplied, 
elders or presbyters were ordained to preach the 
word and administer the sacraments : the bishop 
reserving to himself the power of governing, or- 
daining and sending fresh labourers into the 
vineyard^ as necessity required. This will explain 
the reason why in this epistle to the church at 
Philippi, St. Paul only names the bishups and 
deacons. With this agrees the testimony of 
Clemens Romanus, the companion of St. Paul : 
" Jesus Christ," he says, " was sent by God, the 
apostles by Christ, who receiving his commands 
through the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ, 
being indued with fulness of grace, and being sup- 
ported by the word of God and extraordinary 
assistance of the Holy Ghost, preached the gospel 
of the kingdom of God ; and therefore ordained 
through all the cities, and regions where they 
preached, bishops and deacons of their first converts, 
to take care of believers." The anonymous writer 
before quoted justly observes, " Every bishop is a 
priest, and can do ail priestly duties ; but it is not 
so, vice versa." Now it was well contrived, that 
that order should be first appointed which could 
lawfully do every thing which pertained to a Chris- 
tian minister : and there was no need of presbyters 
where the diocese was but one congregation, and 
the bishop could rule and teach himself all his 
converts. But the apostles knew there would be 
need of other assistance as Christianity increased, 
and therefore gave them a power to ordain and 



33 



multiply elders in every city ; which was St. Pauls 
commission to Titus : for this cause I left thee in 
Crete, that thou shouldest set in order the things 
that are wanting, and ordain elders in every city, as 
I had appointed thee." (Titus i. 5.) 

If it can be shown from the writings of the apos- 
tles that the bishop discharged functions which the 
presbyters or elders did not ; and moreover, that 
he exercised authority over presbyters, it will not 
only prove that the one office was distinct and 
separate from the other, but also that the bishop 
was superior to the presbyter. In proof of this, we 
refer to the authority given to and exercised both 
by Timothy and Titus, who exercised the office of 
bishops at Ephesus and Crete, by the appointment 
of St. Paul. For this cause I left thee in Crete, 
that thou shouldest set in order the things that are 
wanting, and ordain elders in every city." (Titus 
i. 5,) " I besought thee still to abide at Ephesus, 
(where it appears from Acts xx. 17, were many 
elders,) that thou charge some that they preach 
no other doctrine." (1 Tim. i. 3.) "Against a 
presbyter receive not an accusation but before two 
or three witnesses." (1 Tim. v. 19.) If, it has 
been justly observed, to order things left undone — 
if to ordain presbyters in every city — if to take 
cognizance of the doctrine of inferior ministers — if 
to receive accusations and sit in judgment on 
presbyters, — if all this does not prove the authority 
of the bishop superior to that of presbyters, we 
know not by what facts superiority can be proved. 

This view is confirmed by the superiority which 
is evidently conceded in the case of several churches 



34 



in the New Testament, to one minister above other 
ministers in those churches. Omitting at present 
the church at Jerusalem, we instance this in the 
case of the seven churches of Asia. The epistle 
addressed to each of those churches, is addressed to 
(i the angel" of the church, i. e, to its chief minister 
or bishop. The probability, to say the least, is 
that each of the Asiatic churches was made up of 
numerous congregations which formed but one 
church, each congregation having its separate pas- 
tor, under the jurisdiction of one bishop, who is 
addressed as " the angel" of the church. We know 
in the case of the church at Ephesus, that there 
were many elders or presbyters. If, as is asserted, 
all ministers in the apostolic churches were equal 
and none superior to others, how does it happen 
that the epistle to the church at Ephesus is ad- 
dressed not to all its ministers, but toone only, as 
" the angel" of that church ? The only reasonable 
reply is, as Hooker observes, that " if there were 
many (ministers), surely St. John, in naming but 
only one of them an angel, did behold in that some- 
what above the rest." 

In the church at Jerusalem, which may be 
called the mother church of Christianity, what is 
now contended for, appears more plainly. The ac- 
counts given us by St. Luke of the multitudes who 
embraced the faith of Christ at Jerusalem , deserve 
notice. After St. Peter's sermon, " three thousand 
were added to the church." Soon after, we are 
informed, "the number of the men who believed was 
about five thousand." (Acts iv. 4.) u The num- 
ber of the disciples still multiplied in Jerusalem 



35 



greatly : and a great company of the priests were 
obedient to the faith. (Acts vi 7.) And when. 
Paul came to Jerusalem, the brethren said to him, 
" Thou seest how many thousands (novai /uLvplddeg, 
i. e. tens of thousands) of Jews there are which 
believe." (Acts xxi. 20.) It would be unreason- 
able to suppose that these myriads of Christians 
assembled in one place and met as one congrega- 
tion : doubtless they met in different places, had 
their respective pastors, yet all constituted the one 
church at Jerusalem. It will be denied by no one 
that there were presbyters and deacons in that 
church ; it appears also, as well from the unvarying 
testimony of the primitive writers, as from facts 
related by St. Luke, that St. James presided over 
the church at Jerusalem as its bishop. Without 
the admission of this, it would be difficult to ac- 
count satisfactorily for that deference shown to him, 
or for that authority exercised by him. In the 
synod held at Jerusalem, to settle the question 
about the circumcision of the Gentiles, after Peter 
had delivered his opinion, St. James delivers his 
with manifest authority : " Wherefore my sentence 
is, that we trouble not them, which from among 
the Gentiles are turned to God," (Actsxv. 19) and 
his sentence proved decisive. St. Paul, on his last 
visit to Jerusalem, was presented to St. James, as 
the bishop of that church. " When we were come 
to Jerusalem, the brethren received us gladly. And 
the day following Paul went in with us unto James ; 
and all the presbyters were present." (Acts xxi. 
17, 18.) " A plain description," observes one, "of 
a bishop in conjunction with his clergy." 



36 



" According to this model of the church at Jeru- 
salem/' remarks a writer before quoted, " the apos- 
tles in other places, as there was occasion, in every 
city set up a bishop, to whom, as Christian con- 
verts were made, was added afterwards a propor- 
tionable number of priests and deacons, who, under 
the bishops, were to take care of the several 
churches in such city, and the neighbouring villages 
depending on it. And from the city, the bishop 
sent out presbyters, as there was occasion, into the 
several remote parts of his diocese, to preach, ad- 
minister the sacraments, and do other matters per- 
taining to the priestly office." 

On the introduction of Christianity into this 
island, the same order of government was observed 
by our ancestors. Episcopal Sees were set up in 
the great towns and cities, and a college of pres- 
byters under them, who were sent forth to preach 
the gospel in the country, and for the settlement of 
parochial ministers, who were subject to the autho- 
rity of the bishops of their respective dioceses. 

2. What has been thus gathered from the writ- 
ings and practice of the apostles, as proving episco- 
pal government to be of apostolic origin, will derive 
confirmation from the universal practice of the church 
immediately after the apostles, and for several suc- 
ceeding centuries. A great mass of evidence, did 
the limits of the present work admit, might here be 
adduced from the early writings of the Christian 
church ; beginning with Clemens Romanus, the 
companion of St. Paul and Ignatius, the disciple of 
St. John, which led to the erection of parochial 
churches which would prove that episcopacy was the 
mode of government which everywhere prevails 1 



37 



in the church. Aerius, towards the close of the 
fourth century, is the only instance for the first four 
centuries, in which a person of note opposed epis- 
copacy, and argued for the equality of bishops and 
presbyters. Aerius was a presbyter of Sebastia in 
Pontus, and an Arian. Having been disappointed 
of the bishopric of Sebastia, to which he aspired, 
he endeavoured to undermine the authority of his 
successful rival, and heading a party against him, 
maintained that bishops and presbyters were equal, 
and equally qualified for all ecclesiastical functions. 
Epiphanius calls his doctrine, " insane, beyond 
the capacity of nature"* The case of Aerius is 
one of those exceptions, which but the more es- 
tablish the general rule, and prove the unvarying 
opinion of the primitive ages, as to the apostolic 
origin of episcopal government. 

Instead of giving the testimonies of the early 
Fathers and writers of the Christian church on this 
subject, the writer prefers giving the reasons of the 
acute Chillingworth, contained in a paper, entitled 
" Apostolic Institution of Episcopacy demonstra- 
ted." Having stated that " episcopacy is not re- 
pugnant to the government settled in the church for 
perpetuity by the apostles," he urges, as the clear- 
est demonstration of this, the acknowledged fact, 
" that this government was received universally in 
the church, either in the apostles' time, or presently 
after." 

" Seeing episcopal government is confessedly so 
ancient and so catholic (universal) , it cannot 

* " ixaviooSrjs fxaKKov rjirep Karaa'raa'ews aydpanrivris." 
E 



38 



with reason be denied to be apostolic" For so 
great a change, between presbyterial government 
and episcopal, could not possibly have prevailed all 
the world over in a little time. Had episcopal 
government been an aberration from, or corruption 
of, the government left in the churches by the 
apostles, it had been very strange that it should 
have been received in any one church so suddenly, 
or that it should have prevailed in all for so many 
ages after. " Variasse debuerat error ecclesiarum ; 
quod autem apud omnes, unum est, non est erra- 
tum sed Iradiium ;" (had the churches erred, they 
would have varied : what therefore is one and the 
same amongst all, came not sure by error, but by 
tradition.) Thus Tertullian argues, very probably 
from the consent of the churches of his time, not 
long after the apostles, and that in a matter of 
opinion, much more subject to unobserved altera- 
tion. But that in the frame and substance of the 
necessary government of the church, a thing al- 
ways in use and practice, there should be so sudden 
a change, as presently after the apostles' times, and 
so universal as received in all churches, this is 
clearly impossible, 

" For what universal cause can be assigned, or 
feigned, of this universal apostacy ? You will not 
imagine that the apostles, all or any of them, made 
a decree for this change when they were living ? or 
left order for it, in any will or testament, when they 
were dying ? This were to giant the question — - 
to wit, that the apostles being to leave the govern- 
ment of the churches themselves, and either seeing 
by experience, or foreseeing by the Spirit of God, 



39 



the distractions and disorders which would arise 
from a multitude of equals, substituted episcopal 
government instead of their own. General councils 
to make a law for general change, for many ages 
there were none. There was no Christian emperor, 
no coercive power over the church, to enforce it. 
Or if there had been any, we know no force was 
equal to ihe courage of the Christians of those 
times. Their lives were then at command, (for 
they had not then learnt to fight for Christ,) but 
their obedience to any thing against the law was 
not to be commanded, (for they had perfectly learnt 
to die for him.) Therefore, there was no power 
then to command this change ; or if there had been 
any, it had been in vain. 

" What device then shall we study, or to what 
foundation shall we reduce this strange, pretended 
alteration ? Can it enter into our hearts to think, 
that all the presbyters and other Christians then, 
being the apostles' scholars, could be generally ig- 
norant of the will of Christ, touching the necessity 
of a presbyterial government ? Or dare we ven- 
ture to think them so strangely wicked all the 
world over, as, against knowledge and conscience, 
to conspire against it ? Imagine that the spirit of 
Diotrophes had entered into some, or a great many, 
of the presbyters, and possessed them with an am- 
bitious desire of a forbidden superiority, was it pos- 
sible that they should attempt and achieve it at 
once, without any opposition or contradiction ? 
And, besides, that the contagion of this ambition 
should spread itself and prevail, without stop or 
control, nay, without any noise, or notice taken of 



40 



it, through all the churches in the world ; all the 
-watchmen, in the mean time, being so fast asleep, 
and all the dogs so dumb, that not so much as one 
should open his mouth against it ? 

" But let us suppose (though it be a horrible 
untruth) that the presbyters and people then were 
not so good Christians as the presbyterians are now ; 
that they were generally so negligent to retain the 
government of Christ's church commanded by 
Christ, which we are now so zealous to restore ; 
yet certainly we must not forget or deny that they 
were men as we are. And if we look upon them 
but as mere natural men, yet knowing by expe- 
rience how hard a thing it is even for policy armed 
with power, by many attempts and contrivances, 
and in a long time, to gain upon the liberty of any 
one people ; undoubtedly we shall never entertain 
so wild an imagination, as that among all the Chris- 
tian presbyters in the world, neither consciousness of 
duty, nor love of liberty, nor averseness from pride 
and usurpation of others over them, should prevail 
so much with any one, as to oppose this pretended 
universal invasion of the kingdom of Jesus Christ, 
and the liberty of Christians. 

" When I shall see, therefore, all the fables in 
the Metamorphosis acted, and prove stories ; when 
I shall see all the democracies and aristocracies in 
the world lie down and sleep, and awake into mo- 
narchies, then will I begin to believe that presbyte- 
rial government, having continued in the Church 
during the apostles' times, should presently after 
(against the apostles' doctrine and will, and the 
will of Christ) be whirled about like a scene in a 



41 



masque, and transported into episcopacy. In the 
mean time, while these things remain incredible, 
and, in human reason, impossible, I hope I shall 
have leave to conclude thus : — 

" Episcopal government is acknowledged to have 
been universally received in the Church presently 
after the apostles' times. Between the apostles' 
times and this presently after, there was not time 
enough for, nor possibility of, so great an altera- 
tion ; and therefore there was no such alteration as 
is pretended. And therefore episcopacy, being 
confessed to be so ancient and catholic, must be 
granted also to be apostolical ." 

It is a remarkable confirmation of the truth of 
the unanswerable conclusions of the ingenious 
Chillingworth, that the Syrian church in the East, 
and the Waldensian church in the West, neither of 
which submitted to Anti- Christ, are both Episcopal 
Churches, and have continued so from the apos- 
tles' days. 

The case of the Syrian church in Travancore is 
very remarkable; its existence can be traced up to, 
or very near to, the times of the apostles ; placed at 
a remote distance from all other churches in the 
south of India ; in the heart of a Pagan country, 
it has been uninfluenced by those changes which 
have been experienced by other churches in Chris- 
tendom. The preservation of such a church, so 
separated from other Christian churches, and in a 
Pagan country, is miraculous. The Syrian Chris- 
tians have maintained the order and discipline of a 
regular church, under Episcopal government, from 
the days of the apostles. When the Portuguese 
e 2 



42 



priests visited them in the fifteenth century, they 
were astonished at finding that these Hindoo Chris- 
tians maintained the order of an Episcopal church, 
and that for thirteen hundred years they had en- 
joyed a succession of bishops, appointed by the 
patriarch of Antioch. " We/' said they to the 
European priests, " are of the faith, whatever you 
from the West may be ; for we come from the 
place where the disciples were first called Chris- 
tians." In this church, the three orders in the 
ministry, of bishop, priest, and deacon, and also 
the use of a scriptural Liturgy, have existed from 
the beginning. Our countryman, Dr. Buchanan, 
who visited the Syrian churches in 1806, gives the 
substance of an interesting conversation which he 
held with one of their bishops, as follows : — " The 
bishop was desirous to know something of the 
other churches which had separated from Rome. I 
was ashamed to tell him how many there were. I 
mentioned that there was a kasheesha, or presbyter 
church in our own kingdom, in which every kas- 
heesah (presbyter or priest) was equal to another. 
6 And are there no shemsanas P' (deacons in holy 
orders.) 'None.' ' And what, is there nobody 
to overlook the kasheesahs?' ' Not one.' ' And 
who is the angel of their church ?' (Alluding to the 
form of the seven churches in Asia, Rev. ii. 1.) 
' They have none.' ' There must be something 
imperfect there,' said he."* 

The existence of the Syrian church in the heart 

* See an interesting account of the Syrian Churches 
in Buchanan's " Christian Researches." 



43 



of India, — a church which never su omitted to 
Anti-Christ, retaining episcopal government and a 
scriptural Liturgy, deriving her episcopacy from 
the earliest and best days of Christianity, — fur- 
nishes one of the strongest proofs of the apostolic 
origin of this mode of church government. 

Such was the order of church government which 
was introduced with Christianity into this island, 
and which flourished here ages before the Church 
of Rome corrupted and usurped authority over the 
churches of Christendom. 

The objection that the episcopacy of the Church 
of England is derived from the Church of Rome, 
is not true, in the sense objected. The Church of 
England had her bishops in her earliest and best 
days, before the apostate Church of Rome claimed 
to exercise authority over her. It is admitted, as 
Dr. Buchanan admitted, to the chaplains of the 
Syrian bishop, who expressed doubts as to the purity 
of English ordination, that apostolic ordination is 
derived through the Church of Rome. To this, 
urged as an objection, the Doctor thus satisfactorily 
replied : — " The impurity of the channel has not 
corrupted the ordinance itself, or invalidated the 
legitimacy of the imposition of hands, any more 
than the wickedness of a high-priest in Israel could 
disqualify his successors. The Church of Eng- 
land assumed that she derived apostolical ordina- 
tion through the Church of Rome as she might 
have derived it through the Church of Antioch." 

Calvin, Beza, and others of the most learned 
and original framers of the presbyterian form of 
church government, pleaded necessity alone for 



44 



the rejection of episcopacy, and at the same time 
strongly avowed their veneration for it. Calvin 
declared those to be " worthy of every anathema" 
who would not reverence and submit to episcopacy 
where it was to be met with in its legitimate form.* 
Beza supposes it hardly possible for a man in his 
senses to reject episcopacy, and considers that 
England had retained her Episcopal hierarchy by 
the peculiar blessing of God, and expresses his 
wish that she may continue to enjoy it.f 

So long as a visible church exists on earth, so 
long will some acknowledged form of church 
government be necessary. Grant, what some de- 
sire, the overthrow and abolition of episcopacy, 
which bears on it the stamp of apostolic oiigin ; 
what form of ecclesiastical government shall we 
substitute in its place ? Divided as the Christian 
church unhappily is, into so many parties, each 
claiming for his own mode of government the 
preference, it would be impossible to devise any 
form of church polity which could present equal 
claims to general suffrage with that of episcopacy. 

* " Talem si nobis Hierarchiam exhibeant, in qua sic 
emineant Episcopi, ut Christo subesse non recusent et 
ab illo tanquam unico capite pendeant. .turn vero nullo 
non anathemate dignos fatear, si qui erunt, qui non earn 
revereantur, sumniaque obedientia observent. — CaL de 
Necess. Eccl. Ref. 

f " Si qui sunt autem (quod sane non mihi facile 
persuaseris) qui omnem Episcopornm ordinemrejiciant, 
absit ut quisquam satis saiice mentis, furoribus illorum 
assentiatur." " Fruatur sane ista singulari Dei bene- 
ficentia, quae utinam sit illi perpetua — Beza a Tract de 
Minist, 



45 



The rapid progress of separation — the multiplica- 
tion of religious sects, and the fierce struggles for 
ascendancy, exhibited during the temporary abo- 
lition of episcopacy, sufficiently indicate the evils 
which would follow the overthrow of the Church 
of England. Experience has demonstrated that 
separatists can never agree to establish any church 
in the room of the Church of England, were she 
destroyed. This Papists well know, and therefore 
desire nothing more ardently than the destruction 
of a church which has proved the great bulwark 
against Popery in these realms. This led a car- 
dinal of the Church of Rome to say — iS He could 
be content that there were no priests in England, 
so there were no bishops !" 

It becomes, then, a question of moment, for the 
serious consideration of those who separate from the 
Established Church, on the ground of episcopacy, 
whether separation on this ground is not only in- 
defensible, but also a practical evil ? Would not 
a different course — one of close adherence to a 
church sound in doctrine, and apostolic in govern- 
ment — be the surest way of bringing about that 
oneness of the church for which Christ prayed, and 
of accelerating the triumphs of Christianity in the 
world ? (John xvii. 21.) As Dean Milner re- 
marks — " Good men, by remaining in the church, 
might do a thousand times more good than they 
would be capable of doing by deserting it. And 
so long as the doctrine itself is preserved sound and 
pure, by the continuance of holy men in the 
church, who in that case can remain with a clear 
conscience, revivals may be expected from time to 



46 



time. Hasty and intemperate schisms rend the 
church into miserable fragments — prevent, as far 
as man can prevent, any great and general revival 
of godliness, and are strongly guarded against in 
the epistolary writings of the New Testament." 



(47) 



CHAPTER III. 

The claims of the Established Church to the 
attachment and conformity of Christians of 
this country. 

If, as it was the design of the previous chapters to 
prove, such a religious establishment as we enjoy 
in this nation, is lawful, expedient, and advanta- 
geous : if, moreover, its mode of ecclesiastical 
government is according to sacred scripture, and 
the universal practice of the church in the earliest 
and best ages of Christianity ; much has already 
been done to prove that the Church of England 
possesses strong claims on the gratitude, attach- 
ment, and conformity of Christians of this nation. 
In proceeding to consider these claims more in 
detail, it is necessary to premise that the brevity 
prescribed in this work will admit only of a notice 
of those which are most prominent. As introduc-' 
tory to this, the following sketch by an eloquent 
preacher and divine of the Established Church, 
\>ill not be considered irrelevant. 

"Who that contemplates the Church of Eng- 
land, not seeking for that perfection which we 
have no right to expect in any institution ad- 



48 



ministered by fallen man, will not be disposed to 
allow, that no religious system is better calculated, 
on the whole, for the accomplishment of that 
which is the object of all rational systems — I 
mean the education of a soul for eternity P Ob- 
serve the holy assiduity with which, as a tender 
mother, she follows us through every step of our 
earthly pilgrimage, and watches over our wants? 
and dangers, and interests. No sooner is our 
child brought into a world of sin, danger, and 
sorrow, than she takes him from our hands, and 
presents him, by a most touching and tender ser- 
vice, to the care of the great Shepherd. After a 
short interval, as he rises to years of thought and 
intelligence, she comes again, and calls him 1 to 
go up to the house of the Lord,' and there to con- 
secrate himself, by a most solemn ordinance, to 
the Lord, as his soldier and servant. She next 
invites him, when weary and heavy laden with the 
burden of unpardoned sin, to that table where the 
Saviour himself may be supposed to preside, and 
to distribute with his own hands the riches of 
pardon and grace. Nor does she leave him here, 
but follows him into all the scenes of domestic 
life. She it is who ties the knot of his family 
joys. She accompanies him to the sick bed, and 
administers to him as he lies there, the sweetest 
consolation. She passes with him into the valley 
of death, cheers him with the most delightful pro- 
mises, and displays to him the glories of the 
invisible world. And when, at length, his remains 
are consigned to the cold earth, she stands as chief 
mourner at his grave ; she sings over him the 



49 



song of sorrow and of gratitude : she discharges 
for him the office which he can no longer dis- 
charge for himself, but which, could he return to 
earth, it would be his soul's first desire to fulfil ; 
she makes the dead the teacher of the living ; and 
leads other sons to glory, by presenting to them a 
hallowed and glowing picture of the joys of him who 
has fallen asleep in the Lord. ( I heard a voice from 
heaven, saying, Write, blessed are the dead which 
die in the Lord."'* 

Among the claims which the Church of Eng- 
land has to prefer to the attachment and confor- 
mity of Christians, the following appear most 
prominent : it is the church established by the 
laws of the country : it was the church to which 
our forefathers were attached, and in defence of 
which a noble army of martyrs died : she has pro- 
ved the faithful depository and guardian of " the 
faith once delivered to the saints : " she has been 
and still is the most efficient instrument of diffu- 
sing the influence of real religion both at home and 
abroad : her services are scriptural, and charac- 
terised by simplicity, solemnity, and adaptation to 
the circumstances of her members : she exhibits at 
the present time abundant evidence of the presence 
and blessing of God with her. 

I. The Church of England is the church esta- 
blished by the government of our country. W hat 
is here urged in favour of the church, is by sepa- 

* Sermon on Church Establishments, by Rev. J. W. 
Cunningham, M.A., Vicar of Harrow: to whom the 
writer takes this opportunity of expressing his obligation 
for many important remarks ia this Chapter. 
F 



50 



ratists stated as a serious objection against her. 
They contend that the state has no right to esta- 
blish religion — that for the state to legislate in 
such matters, is an infringement on the rights of 
God and conscience — that its effect is to corrupt, 
by secularizing religion, and to render it a mere 
engine of state policy. The writer begs to refer 
his readers to the arguments advanced in the first 
chapter, in reply to this objection. While we 
contend that it is lawful, expedient, and imperative 
on the rulers of a nation, to honour God and ad- 
vance the best interests of their people, by an 
establishment of religion ; we equally contend that 
it is not lawful for them to enact what is contrary 
to the laws of God, or to enforce what they do enact 
lawfully in an unchristian manner. " We believe," 
observes one, " that as the apostle, when he com- 
mands every soul to be subject unto the higher 
powers,' makes no reserves in respect of religion, 
neither should we ; and therefore, that we owe the 
same obedience to the legislature, in sacred as in 
worldly matters, when its decisions are confor- 
mable to Scripture, or not opposed to it." 

Even admitting, for the sake of the argument, 
that in such an establishment some things were 
authorized for which no scriptural warrant could 
be produced, unless it can be proved that such 
things are ant i-scriptural ; they of themselves 
form no just cause of separation from it : for what 
section of the visible church is there in which 
some things unscriptural are not to be found ? 

Satisfied that there is nothing in the act of an 
establishment of religion by the state, and that in 



51 



the constitution and services of the religious esta- 
blishment of the country, correctly understood, 
there is nothing anti- scriptural ; it appears to the 
writer, that the peaceful surrender of the mind, 
and submission to things indifferent and non- 
essential, when enjoined by authority, is a Chris- 
tian duty, especially when no sacrifice of essential 
truth is exacted. 

In this light the matter appears to have been 
viewed by those who are entitled to be regarded 
as the fathers of nonconformity in this country. 
They separated from the Church of England, not 
because she was established by the state, and in 
alliance with the state, or from conscientious ob- 
jections to her formularies, worship, and discipline, 
but at first, simply on the ground of subscription. 
In the circumstances of the times, which followed 
the usurpation of Cromwell and the restoration of 
the church and monarchy, will be found the true 
causes of their separation. One of Mr. Baxter's 
biographers gives the following account of the mat- 
ter. u In 1638 he (Mr. Baxter) applied to the 
bishop of Winchester for orders, which he received 
having at that time no scruples about conformity 
to the Church of England. The et ccetera oath 
was what first induced him to examine into this 
point. It was framed by the convocation then 
sitting, and all persons were thereby enjoined to 
swear, that they would never consent to the altera- 
tion of the present government of the church by 
archbishops, bishops, deans, archdeacons, et 
ccetera : and this oath, imposed under the penalty 
of expulsion, compelled them to speak. Many 



complained of the et ccetera, which they said con- 
tained they knew not what." So far was there 
from being any thing in the fact of the establish- 
ment of the church by the state, or any thing in 
the government or services of the church to pro- 
duce their non- conformity, that Mr. Baxter, in 
f A Profession of Religion/ which he drew upat 
the request of a large portion of the puritan in- 
terest, says, f I do hold that the book of Common 
Prayer and of Bishops, Priests, and Deacons, con- 
taineth in it nothing so disagreeable to the word of 
God as maketh it unlawful to live in the peaceable 
communion of the Church that useth it' In the 
spirit of this avowal, those early non-conforming 
ministers acted, in continuing for some time after 
their expulsion from her ministry in communion 
with the Church of England, and in encouraging 
their people to do the same. It has been deemed 
necessary to enter into this statement, to prove 
that those great and good men, as most of them 
confessedly were, separated from the Church of 
England not because she was established by the 
state — not because they could not conscientiously 
live in peaceable communion with her, or comply 
with her ritual, — but because they could not sub- 
scribe to what was imposed, and which pledged 
them to " they knew not what" Had this sub- 
scription not been enjoined as the condition of 
their continuing in the communion and ministry 
of the church, they would have exercised the 
Christian duty of submitting to things indifferent, 
enjoined by authority. " How striking a lesson 
does this hold out to those of the present day, who, 



03 



on the slightest ground, and without any delibe- 
ration, renounce the communion of the church in 
which they have been brought up, and who seem to 
think that to make a schism is even meritorious, and 
a proof of superior piety and discernment." 

II. The Church of England is the church to 
which our forefathers were attached, and to which 
a noble company of martyrs, to whom, under God, 
we owe our deliverance from Popery, sealed their 
attachment with their blood. With respect to the 
first of these motives of attachment to the Church, 
a writer already quoted, observes, — <( It is no slight 
title to our regard, that it was the mode of worship 
chosen by multitudes, to whom our memory turns 
with the deepest feelings of veneration and love. 
Within its pale they found their own safety and 
joy ; and within the same sacred enclosure they 
enjoyned us to seek our welfare ond security. To 
quit the Established Church is to quit the font at 
which they were consecrated to God, the altars at 
which they knelt, and the graves in which they 
are buried. This motive may appear to some to 
partake more of the nature of a sentiment than of 
sound reason ; but mankind appear to us neither 
the wiser nor the better for their contempt of feel- 
ings so deeply seated in our original constitution." 

Many of those great and good men, and re- 
nowned martyrs, as Cranmer, Ridley, Latimer, 
Hooper, and others, who are justly entitled to be 
considered the fathers of the English Reformed 
Church, and who arranged her Liturgy, were men 
eminently endowed by the Spirit of God* " Would 
God," it has been justly argued, <e thus have owned 
p 2 



54 



and honoured the heads of the church, the very 
framers of her formularies and worship, had this 
their work been displeasing to Him — or if it had 
contained any error that concerned the main points 
or chief heads of his own pure Gospel ? And 
would these distinguished servants of God have 
themselves thus died in support of error, or of a 
false church ? God set his seal to the Church of 
England ; he acknowledged her for his own, when 
he thus received and honoured their dying testi- 
mony on her behalf. Oh ! never forget, every 
time you take up the Liturgy, that it is sprinkled 
with the blood of these holy men, ( of whom the 
world was not worthy,' and that they call upon 
you to he followers of them, who ' through faith ' 
in the doctrines it contains, and ' through patience' 
of the sufferings they endured on its behalf, ' now 
inherit the promises.' What other Protestant 
church can produce a testimony any wa}' compa- 
rable with this ? And will you lightly, and with- 
out deep consideration and earnest prayer to God 
for direction, turn your backs upon a church thus 
owned of Hm\ and sealed with the blood of his 
saints ?" 

III. The Church of England has proved the 
faithful depository and guardian for ages, of " the 
faith once delivered to the saints." The former 
motives which have been urged, would possess 
little weight without this. On the other hand, the 
concession may fairly be asked, that a church above 
all others faithful as" a witness and keeper of Holy 
Writ," and which has been, under God, the 
honoured instrument of preserving for ages the truth 



55 



of God in its purity and fulness, has claims on our 
attachment of no common magnitude. 

On this ground, the venerable Establishment of 
our country strongly appeals to us. She secures 
the reading of large portions of the holy Scriptures 
— eight chapters at least, including the Psalms — 
to the people every Lord's day ; — a provision this, 
for the instruction of their people, made by no 
other church in existence. By this means, as also 
by her Articles and by the use of her Liturgy, she 
has maintained the truth of God for ages, while 
others, destitute of these advantages, have erred 
from the faith, and fallen an easy prey to false 
doctrines, which false teachers have privily brought 
in amongst them.* 

* The following observations contained in a Sermon 
preached by Dr. Blomfield, the present excellent Bishop 
of London, are added as more fully stating and confirm- 
ing what is advanced above. 

" We assert then the value of our Established Church, 
as a depository of gospel tr uth ; and as a resting place 
in times of error and confusion. It is true, indeed, that 
this uniformity in the public teaching of religion, so 
necessary to the avoiding of confusion and disorder, 
might be, to a certain extent, attained by the church, 
even if it were not established by law. But the church 
would not possess the same means of preventing unne- 
cessary innovations, nor of enforcing, on the part of its 
teachers, a compliance with the solemn engagement, 
into which they have entered, rightly to divide the word 
of truth. In proof of this position it may be observed, 
not only that dissent, as it exists in this country, con- 
tains within itself the germinating principle of endless 
division, and consequently, of endless confusion ; but that 
it has no security whatever for the permanency or con- 
sistency of its own doctrines, or discipline, even from 



The importance of this view of the subject will 
appear by a reference to facts. The Syrian church, 
to which reference has already been made, and 
which has existed for ages in the midst of a Pagan 
population, is a striking instance of the truth now 
advanced. fC Here," says Buchanan, u as in all 
churches in a state of decline, there is too much 

year to year. It is well known that in many parts of 
the kingdom places of worship, which were endowed 
more than a century ago with a competent provision for 
ministers, who should preach the doctrines commonly 
known by the name of Calvinistic, have now, but with 
few exceptions, been converted into schools of unitarian, 
or deistical opinions. From such a descent into the 
depths of error, fr om such a passage out of light into 
darkness, an establishment, and an establishment only 
under the prevalence and guidance of God, lias pre- 
served, and will preserve, the people of this country at 
large: not only ourselves who belong to that establish- 
ment, but even the great body of those who differ from 
us : for however reluctant they may be to admit it. the 
truth is, that the Articles, and Liturgy, and Homilies of 
our church, are the standard of their own orthodoxy, 
and the pillars by which it has been upheld, under the 
pressure of all those causes of disunion and change, 
which are inherent in their system of discipline. This 
permanent and durable character, by which the church 
is distinguished, as a depository and stronghold of the 
truth, has pointed it out as a place of repose and refuge 
to many. who. having tried the different modes of wor- 
ship and instruction which are regulated only by the 
zeal and judgment of individual teachers, and having 
found no rest for the soles of their feet, have at length 
fled for shelter and peace, to the ark of her ancient 
ordinances, her scriptural confession and liturgy, her 
apostolic ministry and discipline : God is not the author 
of co a fusion* hut of peace.''' — The Uses of a Sta?iding Min- 
istry and an Established Church* p. 32—36. 



formality in the worship. But they have'lAi Bible, 
and a scriptural Liturgy, and these will save a 
church in the worst of times. These may pre- 
serve the spark and life of religion, though the 
flame he out. And as there were but few copies of 
the Bible among the Syrians, (for every copy was 
transcribed by the pen,) it is highly probable that, 
if they had not enjoyed the advantage of the daily 
prayers and daily portions of Scripture in their Lit- 
urgy, there would have been, in the revolution of ages 
no vestige of Christianity left among them." The 
doctor adds, — " In a nation like ours, overflowing 
with knowledge, men are not always in circum- 
stances to perceive the value of a scriptural Liturgy. 
When Christians are well-taught, they think they 
want something better. But the young and igno- 
rant, who form a great proportion of the commu- 
nity, are edified by a little plain scriptural instruc- 
tion frequently repeated. A small church or sect 
may do without a form for a while ; but a national 
Liturgy is that which preserves a relict of the true 
faith among the people in a large empire, when the 
priests leave their articles, and their confessions of 
faith. Woe to the declining church which hath no 
scriptural liturgy ! For when the Bible is gone, 
or when it ceases to be read to the people, what is 
there left ?" 

The history of the Church of England furnishes 
proof of the justice of the remarks in the former 
part of this exract. Her reading at stated seasons 
so largely the Holy Scriptures — her established 
forms of worship— her Articles — her Liturgy, — 
have preserved her in the pure faith, and preserved 



58 



the truth of God among us. To this, under God, 
we owe it, that as a church she has gloriously sur- 
vived the assaults of irreligion and fanaticism in 
the days of Cromwell ; of profligacy in the days 
of Charles the Second ; of Popery in those of 
James the Second ; and of every opposing influ- 
ence in every period since the Reformation. 

How striking and monitory the contrast pre- 
sented in the history of some religious societies 
who have rejected the safeguards of authorized 
articles, creeds, and formularies of religion ! 
" The independents rejected them in the days of 
Cromwell, and what a flood of crime and folly 
broke in upon the nation 1* At this day the pul- 

* Dr. Buchanan lias some important remarks on this 
point. " The Puritans," he says, u of a former age in 
England, did not live long' enough to see the use of an 
evangelical formulary. By them the experiment of a 
pure church devoid of form was made under the most 
favourable circumstances. I know not what was want- 
ing of human and local circumstance, according to their 
own principles, to give peculiar doctrines perpetuity ; for 
they assumed that an establishment and human ordinances 
are of no service in supporting and perpetuating the 
church of Christ. But yet. with the first generation of 
men (who had their education in halls and colleges,) the 
spiritual fervour seemed to pass away. Instead of in- 
creasing, it decreased and declined in most places, till 
little more than the name was left. For when the spirit 
is gone, (in a church having no form.) nothing is left. 
In the mean time there was a revival of religion in 
England not amongst them, but in halls and colleges] in 
the midst of rational farms and evangelical articles : 'for 
so if seemed good unto God and from that source is de- 
rived the greater part of pure religion now professed in 
this land, under whatever form it may exist." 



59 



pits once occupied by the Baxters and Owens, -of 
the days of Puritanism, are the strong holds of 
Socinianism. It is a most convincing fact, that 
out of two hundred and twenty-two Unitarian 
congregations supposed to exist in this country, 
only forty-six appear to have been founded by per- 
sons of that persuasion. The other one hundred 
and seventy-six were originally connected with 
orthodox Dissenters. In the church of Geneva, 
no sooner was the subscription to the Helvetic 
confession abandoned, than Arianism took full 
possession of the chairs and the pulpits. It is also 
a striking fact, that although Unitarianism has 
prevailed to a great degree in the Eastern States of 
America, and particularly in Boston, and has swept 
away many orthodox bodies of Christians, it has 
not made its ivay into a single episcopal congrega- 
tion. " Persons accustomed to the Liturgy," says 
a well-informed examiner, " the instant any one 
comes to them, saying, ' I deny the Trinity,' refer 
to their Prayer Book ; and the fruit of such refer- 
ence is, that since the Liturgy of the American 
Church was agreed upon collectively, not one epis- 
copal congregation has fallen into Arianism." 

Facts like these prove, in the strongest manner, 
the immense importance of established creeds and 
scriptural formularies of worship, to preserve in a 
church the truth of God ; and warrant us in claim- 
ing riot only attachment, but conformity to the 
religious establishment of this nation, which has 
thus been honoured of God, as the depository and 
faithful guardian of his own truth. 

IV. The Church of England has been, and still 



60 



continues to be, the most efficient instrument in 
diffusing divine truth, both amongst our population 
at home, and in unenlightened nations abroad. 
That truth, of which she has been the faithful 
guardian, is committed to her in trust for the bene- 
fit of others. How faithful she has proved to this 
trust, and how far on this account she deserves our 
confidence and love, we will now inquire. 

It is a fact which few will deny, and which 
though mentioned before, is repeated here, as one 
of the chief excellencies of the Established Church, 
that larger portions of the Holy Scriptures are read 
in her services, than in the services of any other 
church. " The Directory for Public Worship," in 
the Church of Scotland, orders four chapters to be 
read every sabbath day, i. e. " one chapter of each 
testament at every meeting ;" but this quantum of 
Holy Scripture is but seldom read, in consequence 
of its not being positively ordained as in the 
Church of England. In most dissenting congre- 
gations, the reading of the Scriptures very rarely 
exceeds two chapters on the Lord's day, and in 
many instances this is abridged or omitted, to give 
more time for the sermon. On the contrary, in 
the Church of England, as has been before stated, 
about eight chapters, including the Psalms, are 
statedty read to the people every Lord's day. In 
addition to this, the reading of the Liturgy is a 
declaration of the gospel to her numerous congre- 
gations every Sabbath. It is impossible to con- 
ceive the vast and beneficial extent of influence, 
which, by so large a communication of scriptural 
instruction, the Church of England thus exerts 



over the great mass of the population of the 
country. It will not be asserting too much, in 
saying, she has thus proved the great bulwark 
against error and irreligion, which had otherwise 
overflowed the land. 

Had religious instruction been left, as some 
contend it ought, to voluntary demand and supply, 
what a different aspect, in a religious point of 
view, would this nation have exhibited in the 
present day ! The estimate of the number of 
congregations which has been given, speaks 
volumes on this subject, and shows that without 
the Established Church, the greater part of the 
population would have been destitute of religious 
instruction. 

"Consider," says Mr. Cunningham, " what 
may be regarded as one of the main distinctions 
between the principles of an establishment and of 
the dissenting system. The principle of an esta- 
blishment is, that every man, whether he care for 
religion or not, shall be compelled to build her 
churches and pay her ministers : — the principle of 
dissent is, that no man shall be constrained to make 
such payments, except so far as his own inclination 
leads him to do so.* The question then is, which 
of these two systems is best adapted to the circum- 
stances of a fallen world P Suppose the land to 
be without either churches or chapels, and some 
well-intentioned persons to give themselves to the 
laudable task of supplying it with the means of 
general religious instruction : let them go forth 

* See Appendix C, on compulsory payments to the 
Established Church. 
G 



62 



armed with the principle of an establishment, and 
their path is clear, and their success in the end 
certain. On this principle, even the avowed enemy 
of religion is constrained to sacrifice his objections 
to the common interest, and to lend his aid to the 
public maintenance of the religion he despises or 
hates. But let them go forth, furnished only with 
the principle of dissent, and how hopeless would 
be their embassy ! What would be the reply to a 
petition for churches or ministers, in the houses of 
the worldly, the covetous, the dissipated, the profli- 
gate, the free-thinking ? If, for a time, and under 
peculiar circumstances, or where the spirit of 
religion was peculiarly awakened, places ol worship 
might be built, and ministers of religion sustained, 
does not the slightest acquaintance with human 
nature assure us, that the funds of spontaneous 
contribution would soon be exhausted ; and that 
whilst a few pious individuals would secure to 
themselves the means of instruction, and public 
worship, the bulk of the nation would soon be left 
without them ? It is not true in the cases of tbe 
diseases of the soul, as in those of the body, that 
the demand creates the supply. The more diseased 
the patient, the less anxious is he to seek the 
remedy. Under the sole operation, therefore, of 
the spontaneous system, it is hazarding nothing to 
say, that a land would soon come to suffer a famine 
of the word of God. The aspect of a country, 
where dissent acts in conjunction with the Esta- 
blished Church, can give us no conception of a 
country where dissent stood alone. In the former 
case the desire of religion, created by an establish- 



inent, assists to build the meeting-house ; but 
suppose either church or chapel to depend upon 
the free-will offering of a nation, and neither the 
one nor the other would be long won from the 
natural tastes and liberality of mankind." 

Of late much has been said, by the opponents of 
religious establishments, of the efficacy of what it 
is usual to call the voluntary system, for supplying 
the means of religious instruction to the nation at 
large. After all that the writer has heard and read 
on this point, and he has heard and read what can 
be advanced on both sides, he is fully convinced 
that the voluntary principle is totally insufficient to 
extend and maintain religious instruction over the 
length and breadth of any country : it never yet 
has done it, in a single instance ; and while human 
nature remains what it is, it never can be expected 
to do it. The advocates of the voluntary principle 
would annihilate the Establishment, and depend 
on the free contributions of the people to rear 
places of religious worship, and secure ministerial 
instruction throughout the country. It requires 
but the slightest consideration, and attention to a 
few plain facts, to show how Utopian is such a 
theory. The free contributions so much vaunted, 
can only be expected to come from those who 
duly appreciate the value of religion, and whose 
hearts are expanded, and whose purse strings are 
loosened by charity towards the souls of those who 
are " ignorant and out of the way." Would it be 
right, or christian, or safe to the moral interests of 
the nation, to trust to the uncertain and feeble 
operations of such a principle for the spread and 



64 



maintenance of religion among us ? Do not the 
frequent complaints of Dissenters, who rely on the 
voluntary principle, of the difficulty felt in paying 
the stipends of their ministers, of keeping up their 
chapels and societies, and their oft-expressed 
regrets that they are unable to occupy promising 
fields of exertion for want of funds, aided as they 
are by numerous endowments, sufficiently show the 
inefficacy of the principle of which they boast ? 
The present state of our own country considered in 
a religious point of view, is such as to demonstrate 
the insufficiency of the voluntary system, for the 
purposes of national religious instruction. Ask 
the Dissenter himself, whether the people of this 
country are yet adequately supplied with religious 
teachers and places of worship ? He will, without 
hesitation, reply, they are not. What then is the 
consequence of this one allowed fact ? Why, that 
the united effects of the compulsory and voluntary 
systems together are insufficient to supply those 
wants which the Dissenters are urging the legisla- 
ture to leave to the mercy of the voluntary system 
alone ; and this after the voluntary system has 
been worked for nearly two centuries, with all the 
zeal and assiduity with which good and bad feel- 
ings could inspire its friends, and preached up 
through all the corners of the land. The voluntary 
principle in a city or town, where the religious 
feeling has been sufficiently called into exercise, 
may rear a place of worship, and support a standing 
ministry : but it would leave our thousands of 
villages, and the scattered population of our rural 
districts, destitute of the means of grace, or for the 



65 



most part dependent on the casual instruction of 
itinerant teachers, many of whom should he content 
to learn, rather than assume the office of teaching 
the principles of religion to others. If any thing 
he necessary to he added to what has already been 
remarked of the inefficiency of the voluntary 
system, it is supplied by the example of America. 
To America the dissenter points with triumph in 
support of the efficacy of his favourite principle. 
" I refer next,*' says Mr. James, "to America; 
and the anxiety manifested to deprive us of the 
force of this proof of the power of the voluntary 
principle, plainly shows the imporiance which is 
attached to it by our opponents." What, however, 
is the state of America, as it regards religious 
instruction, after all the mighty results of the 
voluntary principle ? We must learn this, not 
from the partial representations of mere theorists, 
but from the unbiassed statements of Americans 
themselves. It appears from the testimony of 
American divines, and the writers principally re- 
ferred to are not Episcopalians, but Presbyterians ; 
that, in consequence of the great body of the 
people being left to provide and maintain 
their own religious teachers, " great numbers are 
without any teachers at all, or at least without any 
who deserve the name ; and those vast districts 
are, to all appearance, rapidly sinking into hea- 
thenism : no public honour paid to God's holy 
name, no Sabbath observances, no solemn forms of 
worship, no stated exposition of Scripture, no 
ministerial oversight nor guidance, — not for want 
of men, who are ready to enter upon a field of 
g2 



66 



labour the most uri pro raising, if a bare subsistence 
were provided for them ; but because the people 
will not be at the cost of their maintenance, nor of 
churches for them to preach in. Such, we are 
verily persuaded, is the state of things into which 
our own country would gradually verge, if its 
national church were subverted : and this surely is 
a state of things, the bare possibility of which may 
well inspire a dread of such an experiment into the 
minds of those who desire the happiness and pros- 
perity of their country, and who are persuaded that 
without religion, that is, without Christianity, no 
people can be really happy, nor permanently pros- 
perous. Deprive the nation of its regular clergy, 
take from them the moderate endowments which 
are left them out of the spoils of a far wealthier 
church ; and what will you effect ? The transfer 
of those endowments from those who earn them by 
a faithful discharge of the most important public 
duties, to those who are not bound to the perform- 
ance of any. But you will do more than this ; 
you will shut up, in many a village and hamlet of 
our land, not only the parsonage, but the school 
and the dispensary ; the local centre and shrine of 
knowledge, and charity, and sympathy, and order : 
and you will leave the people without any antagonist 
principle to counteract the workings of a corrupt 
nature, acted upon at every moment by all the 
elements of disorder and confusion, and driven to 
and fro by every gust of wild opinion and fanatical 
impiety."* 

While the Church of England has been most 
extensively useful in supplying our own population 
* Bishop of London — ut supra, p. 39, 40. 




67 



with the means of religious instruction, she prefers 
equal claims on our love and gratitude, on account 
of her successful efforts in spreading the gospel 
among unenlightened nations abroad. The 
Church of England possesses this characteristic of 
an apostolic church ; she is animated by a mis- 
sionary spirit. Her charity towards mankind is 
bounded only by the extent of man's misery — it is 
wide as the world. With what a spirit of Christian 
compassion does she pray : " Have mercy upon 
all Jews, Turks, Infidels, and Heretics, and take 
from them all ignorance, hardness of heart, and 
contempt of thy word ; and so fetch them home, 
blessed Lord, to thy flock, that they may be saved 
among the remnant of the true Israelites, and be 
made one fold under one Shepherd, Jesus Christ 
our Lord !" And is not her conduct in beautiful 
accordance with this prayer ? By means of her 
church establishment in the East and West Indies 
— her venerable Society for the Propagation of 
the Gospel — her missionary and other kindred 
institutions, she is extensively and successfully 
spreading " the gospel of the grace of God'* among 
nations where, a few years ago, " Christ was not 
named." 

V The religious services of the Church of Eng- 
land are scriptural, and characterized by sim- 
plicity, solemnity, and adaptation to the circum- 
stances of her members. In her authorized formu- 
laries of devotion, there is a decided and frequent 
recognition of all those great doctrines of Chris- 
tianity, necessary to salvation, and the edification 
of the Christian church. " The general strain of 



68 



her Liturgy is scriptural, evangelical, and experi- 
mental: it recognizes with precision the One great 
object of worship, in his personal distinctions and 
glorious attributes — the honours and offices of the 
.Redeemer — the power and agency of the Holy 
Spirit — the evil of sin — the depravity of man — and 
all the distinguishing doctrines of the gospel. As 
to the composition, I question if any in the 
English language four version of the Bible ex- 
cepted) is worthy of being compared with it, for 
simplicity, perspicuity, energy, and comprehensive 
fulness of expression." To this testimony of a 
deceased clergyman may be added that of an 
esteemed living one : — " The matter is so majestic 
and meek — so supplicatory of all good, and depre- 
catory of all evil — so expressive of humility and 
reverence, of faith and hope, of gratitude and love ; 
and the petitions, though numerous, are so short 
and devotional, yet so full of the best desires for 
the church and the world, for Gentiles and Jews, 
for the honour of God and the happiness of man, 
that we cannot imagine an objection, in an unpre- 
judiced and Christian mind. That which gives 
the whole a peculiar excellency, is the Christian 
use it makes of that name — which is above every 
name — the name of Jesus, which it delights to 
exalt. The perpetual reference also to those influ- 
ences which alone can direct the understandings 
and affections of men in the way of wisdom and 
peace, shows the firm faith of our reformers in c the 
Holy Ghost as the Lord and Giver of life;' and 
this imparts vitality to the whole. For this 
heavenly energy breathes throughout, whether we 



69 



are pouring forth our desires for our gracious 
Sovereign or his council — for the clergy or the 
people — for the church or the world." 

The comprehensiveness and adaptation of the 
Liturgy to the diversified feelings and circum- 
stances of her worshippers, are unrivalled in any 
other formularies of devotion, and show that those 
who composed it must have been endowed with no 
ordinary measure of divine influences. In every 
state of feeling, and under every possible variety of 
circumstances, here are petitions which meet our 
wants, whether they he temporal or spiritual. Ap- 
plicable as this remark is to the whole book of 
Common Prayer, it will with peculiar force apply 
to the Litany. There must be something wrong in 
the state of that person *s heart, who feels that the 
use of such scriptural and devout prayers tends to 
produce formality, and who does not feel a devo- 
tional spirit thereby excited and improved. 

To the testimonies which have been given to the 
excellency of the devotional formularies of the 
church by two of her clergy, and which may on 
that account be regarded as rather partial, we will 
add the testimony of ministers who dissent from 
her communion. The late pious and eloquent 
Robert Hall, one of the most distinguished dissen- 
ters of his day, says of the Liturgy , — " The evan- 
gelical purity of its sentiments, the chastised fervor 
of its devotion, and the majestic simplicity of its 
language, have combined to place it in the very first 
rank of uninspired compositions." Another dis- 
tinguished dissenter observes, — " The Liturgy 
secures the reading of a large portion of the Scrip- 



70 



Hires ; besides the aid it affords to the most devout 
and spiritual, a great body of evangelical truth is, 
by constant use, laid up in the minds of children 
and ignorant people ; and when they begin to pray 
under the influence of religious feeling, they are 
furnished with suitable, sanctifying, solemn, and 
impressive petitions. Persons well acquainted with 
the Liturgy, are certainly in a state of important 
preparation for the labours of the preacher ; and 
their piety often takes a richer and more sober cha- 
racter from that circumstance. " 

The writer is aware that the principal objection 
urged against the Liturgy, is its being a prescribed 
and unvarying form. This objection, and others 
urged against the church, he may take a future op- 
portunity of considering. 

VI. The Church of England exhibits at the 
present time abundant evidence of the presence and 
blessing of God with her. 

It is a remarkable fact, that the great revival of 
religion which took place in this kingdom some 
years back, which extended its influence across the 
Atlantic, and to which may be traced the greater 
part of pure religion now professed in this land, 
under whatever form it may exist, was effected, 
through the blessing of God, by the labours of 
ministers of the Established church. It began, as 
Dr. Buchanan observes, "in halls and colleges, in 
the midst of rational forms and evangelical arti- 
cles." Whitfield and Wesley, the most active in 
extending the effects of this great revival of religion, 
were ministers of the Establishment: the latter 
most strongly deprecated and opposed the separa- 



71 



tion of his people from her communion. It is a 
fact no less deserving of attention, that, in the pre- 
sent day, when the tide of latitudinarianism and 
opposition has set in against her, and when she is 
most threatened with danger, the Establishment is 
most honoured and blest of God. At what former 
period in the memory of any living, could she point 
to such numerous congregations — to an equal 
number of clergy, so diligent, so zealous, and so 
successful, in promoting the best interests of man- 
kind and the glory of God ? If in days past, and 
past we trust for ever, she was reproached by her 
adversaries, with formality and inefficiency, God 
has remarkably interposed to roll away her re- 
proach — for the glory of the Lord is risen upon 
her ! In proof of this, we refer to the great revival 
of religion, which within the last few years has taken 
place in the Established Church. The writer may 
be suspected of partiality, but he avows it as his 
deliberate conviction, the result of extensive obser- 
vation and inquiry, that the revival of religion in 
this country, to which he now refers, has for the 
most part originated and prevailed within the pale 
of the Establishment. This is candidly acknow- 
ledged by many who are separate from her commu- 
nion. 

This revived and prosperous state of religion in 
the Church of England, contributes in no small 
degree to the religious improvement of those com- 
munities separated from her. As in the natural 
world it would be impossible to confine the genial 
influence of spring within our own garden or field ; 
so has it happened here — the influence of a revival 



72 



ofreligion in the Establishment, has already diffused, 
and still is diffusing itself most extensively, and is 
covering our country with " the beauties of holi- 
ness " 

It is the order of God, that whom he makes the 
recipients of his blessings, those he renders bless- 
ings to others — " 1 will bless thee, and thou shalt 
be a blessing." One illustration of the truth of 
this we have seen in the beneficial influence which 
it enables the Establishment to exert at home: 
this also renders her an extensive blessing to dis- 
tant and unenlightened parts of the earth. With 
renovated energies she assumes the lofty, the holy 
bearing of the evangelist of the ivorld : she feels 
that this is the high destiny assigned her by God, 
and with what astonishing success she is fulfilling 
her benevolent commission, the records of her re- 
ligious institutions declare. 

Such proofs of the presence and blessing of God 
with the Established Church, prove that she is not 
" contrary to the spirit and detrimental to the in- 
terests of Christianity and ought to conciliate 
towards her the best wishes and secure for her the 
prayers, of all Christians. Can attachment and 
conformity to a church so blessed of God be a sin 
or a mark of fully ? Is not hostility to her, to 
fjGfht against God ? Notwithstanding some things 
objected to her, and which the writer hopes to con- 
sider before he closes this work, the Church of 
England has, in the particulars which have been 
stated, claims to prefer, sufficient to constrain those, 
who keep at a distance from her communion, to 
say, " We ivill go with you, for ive perceive that 
God is with you." 



CHAPTER IV. 

The Lawfulness or Unlawfulness of Separation 
from the Established Church, considered. 

A dissenting minister of considerable eminence, in 
a recent publication, remarks : " Causeless sepa- 
ration is the essence of schism : a sin of which 
that man is guilty who knows not why he is a dis- 
senter." The essence of schism is here defined to 
be causeless separation : that separation, it is con- 
tended, is causeless, which is not authorized by 
the conduct of Christ and his apostles, and by the 
requirements of sacred scripture, and therefore 
constitutes the sin of schism. The learned author 
of the history of Infant Baptism says, " It is a 
harder thing to repent of the sin of schism in Eng- 
land, than it is any where else : for the common- 
ness of any sin does, in unthinking minds, won- 
derfully abate the sense of the guilt of it." 

It would lead us too far from our present design, 
to trace the various causes in which that spirit of 
separation has originated, which has so long, and 
most unhappily divided, the visible church of 
Christ into so many sects and parties. It is hu- 
miliating to consider, that much of this may be 

H 



>J5 



traced to what we are justly accustomed to regard 
as a special blessing to our nation. " It would not 
be easy/' observes one, t( to set too high a value on 
the advantages of the Reformation — on the blessing 
of being emancipated from the unreasonable usur- 
pation and gross superstition of the Papal See. 
But at the same time it is sufficiently manifest, that 
men have been unable to maintain the balance evenly 
between the opposite extremes ; that exulting in their 
escape from ' a yoke which neither they nor their 
fathers were able to bear/ they formed far too extra- 
vagant an idea of that ( liberty wherewith Christ has 
made them free' — detesting their former thraldom, 
they spurned at every, the least vestige of spiritual 
subjection : having learned to view with disgust the 
corrupt practices and superstitious mummeries of 
Rome, they began to conceive that all was corrupt 
and all was superstitious, that could be traced to 
that polluted channel ; until every ceremony, how- 
ever decent and significant — every posture of de- 
votion, however expressive of humility and rever- 
ence — every garment of worship, however simple 
and unostentatious, became offensive to their un- 
reasonable prejudices. The Reformation, too, 
being in point of fact a separation from an Esta- 
blished Church, has manifestly operated with many 
weak minds, incapable of drawing accurate dis- 
tinctions, as a precedent for any future separations 
whatever : and forgetting the wide difference be- 
tween a corrupt church usurping an authority 
beyond her sphere, and a reformed church claiming 
her just dominion over her natural members, men 
have too readily conceived themselves justified in 



75 



adopting every schismatical measure which caprice 
or fanaticism or party spirit might suggest to them." 

To these observations we may add, that the 
cause of those religious separations, by which the 
unity of the church is broken, are deeply seated in 
the natural heart of man. The natural obliquity 
of the human mind — its impatience of control, 
and overweening conceit of superior knowledge 
and sanctity, and in many instances, the lust of 
power, will sufficiently account for much of that 
state of things to which we now refer. 

In deciding as to the lawfulness or unlawfulness 
of separation from the Established Church, it will 
be necessary to consider, ( 1 ) Under what circum- 
stances separation from a church is lawful, and a 
duty ; and (2) Under what circumstances is it un- 
lawful and an infraction of Christian unity. 

I. In what cases separation from a church is 
lawful and a duty. The learned author before 
quoted,* states four grounds of justifiable separa- 
tion. " When a lawgiver names some particular 
exceptions of cases in which the law shall not 
oblige, that law binds the stronger in all cases not 
excepted ; for it is supposed, if there had been any 
more, he would have named them too. The Scrip- 
ture gives a very positive law against separations : 
it excepts some cases : and it must be a very pre- 
sumptuous thing to add any more of them of our 
own heads ; they are these : — 

* Wall's History of Baptism, vol. ii, 421, et seq. The 
whole of the chapter from which the above abridged ex- 
tracts are made, is deserving the attention of such as 
desire further information on these points. 



76 



(1.) " If a church do practice idolatry. St. 
Paul, warning the Corinthians of the heathen ido- 
laters, says, * Come out from among them, and be 
ye separate.' " (2 Cor. vi. 17.) 

(2.) " If a church teach doctrines encouraging 
anv wickedness, or destructive of the fundamentals 
of' Christian faith. (2 Tim. ii. 17.) St. Paul 
commands Timothy ' to shun tliem,' " &c. 

(3.) " The Scripture commands that no sin be 
committed to obtain any purpose ever so good. 
Therefore a church that will not admit us without 
our doing a thing that is wicked, or declaring and 
subscribing to something that is false, does thereby 
thrust us out from her communion ; and the guilt 
of the sin of separation lies at her door." 

(4.) If a church be schismatical. " Mark those 
that cause divisions and offences, contrary to the 
doctrine which you have learned, and avoid them" 
(Rom. xvi. 17.) 

" These exceptions I find in Scripture, and I 
know of no more that reach to churches. He that 
separates from any church upon any ground except 
one of these four, ought to take heed, and be well 
assured that he find his ground in the Scripture." 

For the above reasons, had there been no other, 
our forefathers were justified in separating from the 
Church of Rome, as a church practising idolatry, 
teaching doctrines subversive of the fundamentals 
of Christian faith, and enjoining on her members, 
practices sinful and anti-scriptural. Separation 
from such a church was an act of obedience to the 
divine command, " Come out of her, my people, 



that- ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye 
receive not of her plagues." (Rev. xviii. 4.) 

The separation from, or renunciation of the au- 
thority of the Church of Rome, by the Church of 
England, though it may be justified on the grounds 
just stated, admits of a stronger justification on 
other premises. The Papist demands, "Where 
was your Church before Luther ?" By such a 
question it is insinuated, that the Church of Eng- 
land began to exist at the Reformation ; that Po- 
pery was the only religion known and professed by 
our forefathers ; that the Church in these realms 
was always in a state of subjection to the Church 
of Rome ; and that she is schismatical in her se- 
paration from that Church. It is not a sufficient 
reply to the question noticed, to say that the 
British Church justifies her separation from that of 
Rome on the ground of the errors and corruptions 
of that Church ; though these, as already stated, 
furnish scriptural grounds for such a separation. 
The advocate of the Church of England may take 
other ground, and when asked by the Papist, or by 
the Dissenters " Where was your church before 
Luther ?" may confidently reply, " Where it is now 
and where it has been for more than seventeen 
centuries." There are no historical facts which 
admit of stronger proof than this — that the British 
Church existed as an independent branch of the 
apostolic Church, many centuries before it was 
brought into subjection to the Church of Rome, or 
even before that Church arrogated supremacy over 
all others.* The subjection of the British Church 
* See Blackstone's Commentaries, b. iv. c. 8. 
h 2 



78 



io Rome, imposed on her a yoke of error and su- 
perstition which our forefathers were unable to 
bear, and against which they often decidedly pro- 
tested, but in vain, till an all-wise and wonder- 
working Providence wronght deliverance at the 
Reformation. The act of separation from, and re- 
nunciation of the authority of, the Church of Rome, 
which then took place, and which Papists condemn 
as schism, and which dissenters urge in justifica- 
tion of dissent from a reformed established church, 
was, in fact, the resumption, on the part of the 
British Church and nation, of that original inde- 
pendence, and of those just rights, which had been 
wrested from them by the Romish hierarchy, f 
Unless, then, it can be shown that the Church 



t See this subject more largely considered in u The 
Church of England a faithful Witness against the Errors 
and Corruptions of the Church of Pome " by the Author. 
The Author has now before him a tract published by the 
Society for Promoting Ecclesiastical Knowledge, entitled 
" The Popery of the Church of England /" the tract con- 
cludes with the following sentences : — 

Cm It is a question of some difficulty, whether the 
Church of England be really and truly entitled to the 
appellation of Protestant. That it is the least reformed 
of all the Protestant churches, must be admitted." 

" Consequently, the sooner those hierarchies are re- 
formed, and assimilated to the model of the earliest 
churches, the better, Let every member of them put 
his shoulder to the wheel, without hesitation or fear." 

They who can write or publish tracts of the character 
of the above, in their anti christian crusade against the 
religious establishment of the nation, must have for- 
gotten the divine command, " Thou shalt not bear false 
witness against thy neighbour." 



79 



of England is idolatrous, teaches doctrines subver- 
sive of Christian faith, insists on what is sinful as 
terms of communion, and is schismatical ; separa- 
tion from her on the ground of things indifferent, 
is anti-scriptural and unlawful. 

II. The other inquiry demands a more extended 
consideration : under what circumstances is sepa- 
ration from a church unlawful, and an infraction of 
Christian unity ? The late Dr. Mason, an emi- 
nent American preshyterian minister, in his able 
treatise " On Catholic Communion," has shown, 
that so long as a Christian church maintains the 
fundamental truths of Christianity, and a form of 
worship unencumbered with idolatrous and grossly 
superstitious ceremonies, it is improper to depart 
from that church. He also proves, that in the 
primitive and purest ages of the church, those 
were regarded as guilty of an offence of the greatest 
magnitude, who separated from the church on the 
ground of difference of opinion, in matters non- 
essential and of minor importance. 

The reasoning of St. Paul, Rom. xiv. which had 
for its object the promotion of Christian charity and 
union, bears strongly on this point. He contends 
that a difference in opinion and practice, in things 
merely circumstantial and non-essential, instead of 
justifying separation and an infraction of the unity 
of the church, were the occasions which demanded 
the exercise of mutual and Christian liberality and 
forbearance. Some whom he addressed thought them- 
selves obliged to observe certain ceremonies, from 
the obligation of which others deemed themselves 
exonerated. What, in that case, does the apostle 



so 



inculcate as duty ; to renounce communion with 
each other, and each to worship apart, and form 
separate churches ? No ; but to love each other 
—to abstain from censoriously judging and con- 
demning each other's practice ; in one word, to 
maintain the unity of the Spirit — to follow after 
the things which make for peace. If these prin- 
ciples of liberality and candour, which are not less 
binding on the Christians now, than in the apostles' 
days, w r ere more influential on Christian practice, 
we should have less of disunion and separation in 
the Church of God ; we should then enjoy Chris- 
tian communion upon that broad and happy basis 
recommended by the apostle; thus the breach 
which a contrary spirit has made in the church, 
would be healed, and our spiritual Sion would re- 
semble Sion of old, 4 4 as a city that is compact to- 
gether, whither the tribes go up." 

The existence of improper members, or an ac- 
knowledged decay of religion, or acknowledged im- 
perfections in a church, are not sufficient causes of 
separation. Before we come to the proof of this, 
it is proper to remark on one passage of Scripture 
which has improperly been considered as requiring 
separation from a church, which may happen to be 
in the state here supposed. The passage, referred 
to, is 2 Cor. vi. 17, " Wherefore come ye out from 
among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord." 
These words are clearly a quotation from Isa. Hi. 
1 1 . The words, both in the Old and New Testa- 
ment, enjoin separation from idolaters and idola- 
trous practices. The servants of the true God are 
commanded to separate from heathens, not from 



81 



their Christian brethren. It is, therefore, a per- 
version of this passage, to consider it as enjoining 
separation from the church at Corinth, in which 
great evils began to prevail, or to suppose that it 
authorizes secession from a church of God in 
similar circumstances. There were awful corrup- 
tions in the church at Corinth — a flagrant desecra- 
tion of the Lord's Supper — strifes and divisions — 
and in particular, an offending member, who stood 
charged with a crime of the foulest character ; and 
jet, instead of countenancing the secession of 
genuine Christians from that church, the apostle 
exhorts them to preserve Christian union, to exer- 
cise godly discipline in putting away from them the 
evil. 

This view of the subject receives confirmation 
from the messages which our Lord sent to the 
Asiatic churches, when religion in those churches 
was in an awful state of prostration and decay. The 
case of the church of Sardis will furnish the proof 
and illustration. The state of that church is thus 
described : " Thou hast a name that thou livest, 
and art dead;' 1 (Rev\iii. 1;} religion among them 
was reduced to a mere lifeless form. There were, 
however, in the church, " a feiv who had not de- 
filed their garments," who had maintained the life 
of religion, and who had kept themselves from the 
surrounding contagion and pollution ; these our 
Lord commends, but never once hints that they 
ought to come out and be separate from so corrupt 
a church. In fact, the exhortation to all the 
churches of Asia, "who had ears to hear what the 
Spirit said unto the churches," was to repent and 



82 



reform, and not to separate. For good men to for- 
sake a church, in the case here supposed, would be 
to do all in their power to abandon it to spiritual 
destitution and destruction ; by continuing in it, 
they may be instrumental, by their holy lives and 
earnest prayers, of a revival of genuine religion in 
the church. 

Certain customs or practices in a church, for 
which no express warrant can be alleged from 
Holy Scripture, present no just cause of separa- 
tion. The important distinction between what is 
merely unscriptural, and what is an ^'-scriptural, is 
overlooked by those who contend that practices, 
for which no certain warrant is found in the Scrip- 
tures, justify separation from a church in which 
they exist. In reference to this objection, it has 
been well remarked, in reply to the question, " Is 
the Church of England unscriptural ?" When 
persons ask this question, do they mean to insinuate 
that the Church of England is altogether, or only 
that some things in that church are unscriptural? 
For these are widely different questions- And do 
they distinguish between what is wnscriptnral, and 
what is an ^'-scriptural ? For instance, it may be 
unscriptural to wear a surplice, for that is not pre- 
scribed in scripture : but it is an/i-scriptural to 
worship images, or the host. What some assert : — 
that nothing is to be admitted into the worship of 
God, or the government of the church, which is 
not positively enjoined in the New Testament ; 
and that some things unscriptural in a church, 
justify separation from it, are positions which 
cannot be maintained. To act consistently with 



H3 



such avowals, those making them would find it ne- 
cessary to separate from every society of Chris- 
tians, even the smallest; for what Christian society 
is there, in which certain modes of worship, 
government, and practice, for which there is no 
express warrant in Scripture, are not to he found ? 
Tney who rigidly contend for this principle, 
gladium habent, scutum non habent. " If," says 
Bishop Grove, " the imposition of some indifferent 
things he thought a sufficient ground for separa- 
tion, (as it is now generally urged, since the proof 
of their unlawfulness is despaired of), then we 
must have separated from the apostolic churches, 
who had some such usages, as the holy kiss and 
others, whose indifferency is acknowledged hy their 
being wholly disused ; we must have separated 
from the first churches which succeeded them, 
which had all some indifferent things enjoined ; we 
must separate, at this time, from all the reformed 
churches in the world ; for there is none of these 
which does not require the use of such things as 
we should judge to be cause enough to depart 
from them : nay, when we have once separated 
from the Church of England upon this account, 
we must then separate from one another, and every 
man must be a church by himself. For it is im- 
possible that any society, whether merely human 
or Christian, should subsist without the orderly 
determination of some indifferent things." 

They who separate from the Established Church 
on the score of the imposition of some things not 
enjoined in holy Scripture, and declare it to be a 
duty to follow, and conform to the practice of the 



84 



church in the apostles' days ; to bo consistent, are 
in duty bound to follow every apostolic practice of 
which they find any trace in the New Testament. 
There existed, in the church founded by Christ 
and his apostles, several practices which have since 
been abandoned : for example, the holy kiss, 
(Rom. xvi, 16 ;) washing one another s feet, 
practised and commanded by our Lord, (Johnxiii.;) 
anointing the sick with oil, in the name of the 
Lord, (James v. 14.) also some particular customs 
in their church assemblies, &e, (1 Cor. xi.) The 
practices adverted to have been abandoned, princi- 
pally because they were judged unsuitable to 
modern times and circumstances. The apostolic 
rule, " let all things be done decently and in 
order," which is pleaded for such unscriptural 
alterations and omisssons, may, with equal pro- 
priety and force, be urged in justification of those 
things indifferent in the Churcb of England, which 
are condemned and magnified as unscriptural. 

But without extending these remarks, sufficient, 
it is hoped, has been advanced, to show that the 
general reasons assigned, will not justify separation 
from a church established, holding the truth of 
God, not idolatrous, and requiring nothing, as a 
term of communion, sinful and an ti- scriptural. 

What has been stated, will receive additional 
confirmation from the practice of our Lord and his 
apostles : from the apostolic writings, in which the 
unity of the church is so often inculcated, and 
from the opinions and practices of those who are 
justly considered to have been the fathers and 
founders of dissent in this kingdom. 



85 



1 . The practice of our Lord and his apostles* 
When our blessed Lord condescended to appear on 
earth, there existed, in the Jewish nation, a 
national and established church ; for such, it must 
be admitted, was the Jewish church. At that 
time many corruptions and deviations from the law 
of Moses existed in that church ; not only was the 
sacred office of the priesthood disposed of, in the 
most shameful manner, but many things, of merely 
human invention, had been introduced into the 
Jewish church. Yet notwithstanding all this, 
neither did our Lord nor his apostles separate from 
this church. The argument arising hence, is 
thus stated by a nonconformist writer : — " So long 
as God continueth the doctrine of salvation to a 
people, and his solemn worship, so long he dwells 
among that people, and salvation may be had 
there : and that no utter separation may be made 
from those assemblies, where God dwelleth, and 
where men may be assured to rind salvation, though 
there may be great corruptions both in doctrine 
and worship in those assemblies. There were so 
in the church of the Jews in Christ's time ; the 
priests and teachers were ignorant and wicked, and 
had a corrupt and unlawful entrance into their 
calling ; and the people were like to the priests 
generally, notoriously and obstinately ungodly : 
and the worship used in that church was wofully 
corrupt ; many superstitious ceremonies, the obser- 
vation whereof was more strictly urged, than the 
commandments and ordinances of God 5 yet the 
word tells you, Christ (whose example it binds 
you to follow, and you profess yourselves followers 
1 



86 



of him in all imitable things) made no separation 
from this church, professed himself a member of 
it, was by circumcision incorporated a member of 
it, received baptism in a congregation of that 
people, was a hearer of their common service and 
their teachers, allowing and commanding his dis- 
ciples to hear them, communicated in the Passover 
with the people and the priest. No more did his 
apostles make separation from this church, after 
his ascension, till their day had its period. Peter 
and John went to their public prayer in their 
temp]e. So Paul and Barnabas in their synagogue. 
By their example, it appears, that till God hath 
forsaken the church, no man may forsake itM 

Unless, then, it can be shown, that God hath 
forsaken the Church of England, of the contrary 
to which we have most abundant and delightful 
proof, continuance in her communion appears to 
be not a sin, but a duty. 

2. The numerous and weighty exhortations in 
the New Testament, to preserve the unity of the 
Church of God, prove the same thing. The Sa- 
viour himself, who foresaw what divisions would 
distract and lay waste his church in the world, 
deprecated this evil, when he prayed for his people, 
u that they all may be one, that the world may be- 
lieve that thou hast sent me." (John xvii. 2L) 
Those most conversant with the apostolical writings 
will have remarked, with what holy frequency and 
zeal the apostles protested against a spirit of dis- 
union and separation in the professing church, and 
with what holy persuasion and weighty arguments 
they insisted on the preservation of Christian 



I 



87 



unity. They foresaw, with prophetic certainty, 
that difference of opinion and practice would arise, 
the tendency of which would be to make schisms 
in the church, and therefore they inculcated Chris- 
tian unity on that broad basis most likely to pre- 
serve it. (Rom. xiv.) Had the force of those 
considerations which the apostles urged on this point, 
been sufficiently felt, Christians in all succeeding 
ages would have made the fundamental and essen- 
tial truths of religion the basis and the bond of 
their union, and not have made " a schism in the 
body," on account of non-essential differences in 
opinion and practice, in the mere circumstantials 
of religion. 

3. What has been stated, is strengthened by the 
opinions and conduct of those who may justly be 
considered as the founders of the dissenting inte- 
rest in this country. As has been shown in the 
former chapter, the puritans, as it was usual to 
term them, in the first instance seceded from the 
Established Church not from any objections they 
had to her government, worship, or formularies, 
but simply on the score of subscription. On the 
restoration of the church with the monarchy, not- 
withstanding the alteration which took place in the 
church ritual, the non-conformists did not volun- 
tarily withdraw from the church, and set up sepa- 
rate societies ; this was the effect of the terms of 
uniformity prescribed, in agreeing to which they 
deemed that they were required to make such a 
retractation of their former principles, as went to 
vitiate the legitimacy of their previous functions as 
ministers of the gospel. Dr. Mason, an eminent 



88 



presbyterian writer, before referred to, shows that 
but for this compulsion, the non-conformists could 
not have justified it to their own consciences to 
have formed a schism. 

In proof of this, he brings forward the sentiments 
and conduct of some of the leading early non- 
conformists. From his numerous proofs of this 
kind, we will select a few. Dr. Manton protests 
against " the breaking off church fellowship and 
communion, and making rents in the body of 
Christ, because of the difference in opiniou in 
smaller matters, when we agree in the more weighty 
things. We are to walk together as far as we are 
agreed. (Phil. iii. 16.) And externals, wherein 
we differ, lying far from the heart of religion, are 
nothing to faith and the new creature, wherein we 
agree. The most weight should be fixed on the 
fundamentals and essentials of religion ; and 
where there is an agreement in these, private 
differences in smaller matters should not make us 
break off from one another." Baxter writes — " I 
do hold that the book of Common Prayer, and of 
Bishops, Priests, and Deacons, con tain eth in it 
nothing so disagreeable to the Word of God as 
maketh it unlawful to live in the peaceable com- 
munion of the church that useth it ;" " which," 
says Dr. Mason, ** accords entirely with the spirit 
of the English divines in the (Westminster) As- 
sembly, who were generally against abjuring epis- 
copacy, as simply unlawful." 

That deservedly admired divine, John Howe, 
who lived in the days of Cromwell, and was one of 
the most eminent of the non-conforming ministers, 



in a tract, written by him in defence of occasional 
conformity, confirms the truth of the above state- 
ment. (< How notorious is it," he says, " that 
generally they (the puritans) that continued in 
their native land, as far the greater number did, 
looked not upon the Church of England as no 
church that they w 7 ished her more reformed : 
but, in great part, kept in her communion. In 
1662, the same spirit and sentiment afresh ap- 
peared ; when most of the considerable ejected 
London ministers met, and agreed to hold occa- 
sional communion with the (now) re-established 
Church ; not quitting their own ministry, or de- 
clining the exercise of it, as they could have oppor- 
tunity : and as far as I could by inquiry learn, I 
can little doubt this to have been the judgment of 
their fellow-sufferers through the nation, in great 
part, ever since." 

In the early days of non-conformity, those ob- 
jections, which it is now so common to allege in 
justification of dissent, were not felt.* These are 

* The truth of the above remark might be shown in 
reference to many objections which it is now common 
to hear alleged against the Church of England. In a 
note it will be sufficient to advert to one : i e. the un- 
lawfulness of religious establishments I This is a discovery 
of very recent origin. " It would," says Dr. Dealtry, 
" be very difficult, I believe, to point out any writer 
who held such an opinion, till within the last thirty or 
forty years. Previously, the objection had not been as 
to the lawfulness, but as to their form and quality : and 
their lawfulness, as well as their expediency and neces- 
sity, were universally admitted. It is remarkable, that 
in favour of religious establishments no persons have 
I 2 



90 



the offspring of that spirit of party which the early 
non-conformists as much deplored as any sincere 
Christian can in the present day. They con- 
sidered, as Howe observes, " the great doctrines 

expressed themselves more decisively than some among 
the most distinguished ornaments of the dissenting body. 
I allude especially to Owen Flavel, and Matthew 
Henry. 

"In adverting to the novelty of the opinion which 
reprobates all ecclesiastical establishments supported by 
law, I have said enough to throw, at least, considerable 
suspicion on them. That a fact of such importance as 
the scriptural unlawfulness of the system should have 
escaped the minds of so many good men of all former 
ages, must indeed be a startling proposition, and require 
very cogent proof : for it is remarkable how anxious 
religious communities have generally been to confirm 
then own opinions by appeals to antiquity — the novelty 
of an argument is not one that is a recommendation." 

It may be a matter of curiosity to know who are the 
originators and apostles of this new objection against 
religious establishments. In all probability they will be 
found not of the number of those whose hoary heads 
and long established character of usefulness and sound 
judgment, give weight to their opinions : — these, under 
the influence of more Christian feeling, shrink from a 
carnal contest against religious establishments There 
is, however, a generation 4 ' more wise," at least in their 
own esteem, "than the ancients." They, in a day in 
which we hear so much of "the march of intellect," 
have discovered principles in Christianity, which es- 
caped the erudite and penetrating research of the mighty 
minds of former ages. These, they propagate with all 
the flippancy, and dogmatism, and verbosity, which are 
the sure indications of superficial attainments and 
ambitious minds. But whence is this hostility against 
the religious establishments of Britain ? It must be 
traced, I fear, not so much to religious principles, as 



91 



of faith, ordinances of worship, and rules of daily 
practice, (common to us all,) unspeakably more 
valuable than this or that external mode or form 
of religion, that is but accidentally and mutably 
adherent thereto." 

Without extending these remarks, the writer begs 
to say, that what he thus submits to the serious 
attention of others, is sufficient to satisfy his own 
mind, that separation from the Established Church 
is inconsistent with the sacred duty obligatory on 
every Christian to endeavour to maintain the unity 
of the church of Christ. 

Our blessed Lord, in his prayer already noticed, 
enforces the great duty of seeking the unity of the 
church, by an argument, the force of which ought 
to outweigh those circumstantial and nonessen- 
tial differences which separate Christians from each 
other : " that they may all be one, as thou, Father, 
art in me and I in thee : that the world may be- 
lieve that thou hast sent me" (John xvii. 21.) 
The union of the first Christians was to those 
around them a mighty and convincing evidence of 

to unhallowed ambition: — to the desire of equality or 
. superiority. Is it not boldly averred, that the sanction 
which the state gives to the clergy of the Establishment 
is felt by those who do not possess it, to be a degrada- 
tion? It is, stripped of all disguises, the lust of pre- 
eminence which animates many in their crusade against 
the church ; which, on their own confessions, is a bless- 
ing, as a means of extending and maintaining pure and 
undefiled religion throughout the nation. If in this, I 
mistake or misrepresent them, I crave their forgiveness 
as I hope to be forgiven by Him whose sole prerogative 
it is to search the hearts and to try the reins. 



92 



the divinity and excellence of the religion they 
professed, and constrained their bitterest enemies 
to say with admiration, " See how these Christians 
love one another !" On the other hand, the dis- 
union and endless separations which have since 
prevailed among Christians, have proved a strong 
temptation to the world to infidelity. Thus, the 
more extensive growth of Christianity has been 
obstructed ; those energies and treasures have 
been employed in establishing and maintaining 
the peculiarities of parties, which otherwise would 
have carried the triumphs of the cross over the 
length and the breadth of a " world which lieth in 
the wicked one." The evils connected with this 
unhappy state of the church are thus forcibly re- 
presented by an eloquent writer : ff Nothing more 
abhorrent from the principles and maxims of the 
sacred oracles can be conceived than the idea of a 
plurality of true churches, neither in actual com- 
munion with each other, nor in a capacity for such 
communion. Though this rending of the seamless 
garment of our Saviour, this schism of the members 
of his mystical body, is by far the greatest calamity 
that has befallen the Christian interest, and one of 
the most fatal effects of the great apostasy foretold by , 
the sacred penman, w T e have been so long familiarized 
with it, as to be scarcely sensible of its enormity, nor 
does it excite surprise or concern, in any degree 
proportioned to what would be felt by one who had 
contemplated the church in the first ages. The 
bond of charity which unites the genuine followers 
of Christ in distinction from the world, is dissolved, 
and the very terms by which it was wont to be de- 



93 



noted, exclusively employed to express a predilec- 
tion for a sect. The evils which result from this 
state of division are incalculable ; it supplies in- 
fidels with their most plausible topics of invective ; 
it hardens the consciences of the irreligious, 
weakens the hands of the good, impedes the effi- 
cacy of prayer, and is probably the principal ob- 
struction to that ample effusion of the Spirit which 
is essential to the renovation of the world." 

How imperative, then, the duty of all Christians 
in the present day, and in the present state of the 
Christian interest, to pray and labour that they 
may, not in spirit only, but in appearance and 
reality also, be one body ; to merge their minor 
and non-essential differences in a vigorous and 
Christian endeavour to secure that cordial and 
visible unity of the church which will demonstrate 
to an unbelieving world the divine mission of their 
Redeemer, and the heavenly excellency of his re- 
ligion. The Church of England, of all the mem- 
bers of the universal true church, appears to the 
writer to present the only centre around which 
Christians in this country can rally and unite. 
Her articles of faith serve as a standard of unity ; 
she enjoins no terms of communion which are 
sinful and anti-scriptural ; she secures to the 
people the fullest measure of scriptural instruction ; 
she is established by that authority to which Chris- 
tians are required to be subject; she is the body, 
from which all other denominations have sprung 
and separated ; and though last named, it is not 
the least among her many interesting claims; — 
God is with her, and in a remarkable manner 



94 



blessing her ministry, to the revival of religion in 
our own land, and for the extension of its triumphs 
throughout the world. 

I will conclude this chapter in the words of 
an esteemed writer and minister of the Establish- 
ment : 

" Blessed, thrice blessed, shall that man be in 
my esteem, whom God shall honour in uniting his 
church. I had rather be the happy instrument 
in advancing such a cause, though I laid but the 
smallest stone in the walls of the temple of peace, 
than enjoy all the fame of all the statesmen, and 
warriors, and philosophers, and poets, and orators, 
who, by conferring temporal benefits on their spe- 
cies, have ever attracted the admiration of man- 
kind ; for the union of the church is the sum of 
human blessedness ; and the highest object at 
which human wisdom and human charity can aim, 
is to bring every man to the vital confession, — e I 
am not of Paul, nor of Apollos, nor of Cephas, but 
of Christ.' It is then that the conquest of the 
world cannot be far distant ; for then the power of 
the saints will no longer be dissipated in party con- 
tentions, but the whole blessed company, marshalled 
under one banner — that of their common Lord — 
bold in the aggression of benevolence, and safe in 
the protection of the promise, may 6 go up on the 
breadth of the earth/ an irresistible combination 
of charity and power,' ( fair as the moon, clear as 
the sun, and terrible as an army with banners.' " 



(95) 



PART II. 

SOME POPULAR OBJECTIONS TO THE CHURCH OF 
ENGLAND CONSIDERED. 



CHAP. I. 

Liturgical Forms. 

" The minds of men/' it has been justly observed, 
" are microscopic — they fix on points, and over- 
look systems." This is precisely the case with 
common objectors against political and religious 
institutions. They know nothing of the principles 
on which they are founded ; and have no idea of 
the perfection of the whole : but they see detached 
parts, without perceiving their mutual dependence 
and connexion : and supposing many of them to 
be useless, if not absolutely injurious, they imme- 
diately inveigh against the system. It is then 
with principles that we are chiefly concerned ; and 
if these are well calculated to answer the great 
object of a religious community, on a large scale, 
we may disregard minor discrepancies, and leave 



96 



them to be adjusted as times and circumstances 
may admit." On the principle avowed in this ex- 
tract, the writer intends to proceed in noticing 
some of the popular objections advanced against 
the Established Church. The limits prescribed 
will not admit of his noticing all the minute ex- 
ceptions which have been taken against the fonns, 
observances, and expressions of the church, even 
down to a capricious prejudice against a particular 
garment or posture. " A man that were unac- 
quainted/' says Bishop Grove, "with the true state 
of our case, that should stand by, and only hear 
the bitter cries and invectives that have been made 
against ceremonies, would be ready to imagine, 
that sure our church was nothing else almost but 
ceremonies. But he would be mightily surprised, 
when upon inquiry he should find, that these cere- 
monies, which had occasioned all this noise, should 
be no more than three : the surplice, the cross 
after baptism, and kneeling at the sacrament. He 
would be amazed to think that these should be the 
things about which so many massy books had been 
written, so great discords and animosities raised ; 
such a flourishing church once quite destroyed, 
and now most miserably divided, after it had been 
so happily restored; and his wonder must be in- 
creased, when he should perceive, that of these 
three, there was but one, and no more, in which 
the people were any way concerned. The cross 
and surplice are to be used only by the minister, 
and if his conscience be satisfied, no man's else 
Meed be disturbed about them." The non-cou- 
fonnist, John Howe, vindicating occasional con- 



97 



formity, remarks, " He must have mean and mis- 
shapen thoughts of the Christian religion, that thinks 
not the great doctrines of faith, ordinances of 
worship, and rules of daily practice, (common to 
us all,) unspeakably more valuable than this or 
that external mode or form of religion, that is but 
accidentally and mutably adherent thereto." 

It is objected against the Church of England 
that she uses liturgical forms of prayer. It is 
urged that the use of forms of prayer in the wor 
ship of God is unscriptural — less edifying than 
extempore prayer — that it is unadapted to the per- 
petually varying feelings and circumstances of " the 
worshippers — reduces the most interesting and so- 
lemn part of the worship of God to mere bodily exer- 
cise atid formal devotion — and, moreover, that the 
prayers of the Church of England abound in vain 
repetitions. The objection just stated is not 
directed against the matter of the prayers of the 
church, the excellency and accordance of which 
with Scripture are generally admitted ; but against 
the stated use of a form of prayer. 

This practice is said to be unscriptural. So 
far is this from being the case, that forms of prayer 
are encouraged and enjoined by the Scriptures, 
God himself prescribed a form of words, in which 
the priests under the law were to bless the congre- 
gation. (Numbers i. 22, 23.) Our Lord sanction- 
ed forms of prayer : he attended on the worship of 
the Jewish church in which liturgical forms were 
practised, and never once condemned them ; yea, 
more, he taught his disciples to use a form of 
prayer. It is said, that in teaching his disciples 

K 



98 



the use of that prayer, which on that account is 
called, t{ The Lords Prayer," Christ only intend- 
ed to give them a model of prayer. In reply to 
this, we remark, that nearly the whole of the sub- 
lime prayer in question, was taken by our Lord out 
of the Liturgies then in use in the Jewish church. 
"Hence," remarks one, "it is probable that the 
Lord, by his Spirit, had more or less directly dic- 
tated those Liturgies, for it is not likely that he 
would borrow from a merely human composition. 
It shows us also how far Christ was from affecting 
novelties, or from despising any thing because it 
was a form : two very common errors of the pre- 
sent day." The occasion on which oar Lord 
taught this prayer, is thus stated by St. Luke : 
" One of his disciples said unto him, Lord, teach 
us to pray, as John also taught his disciples ; and 
he said unto them, When ye pray, say, Our Father." 
&c. The natural conclusion is, that John had 
taught his disciples a form of prayer, and that 
Christ gave this comprehensive prayer to be used 
by his disciples as a form also. In this light, the 
Lord's Prayer was considered and used, as a form 
of supplication, by the Church of God in the 
purest and best days of Christianity. Had forms 
of prayer been inadmissible and unlawful, he who 
seeth the end from the beginning, and who enjoins 
us to learn of him, would not have sanctioned such 
a practice, much less have set us the example in 
his own practice. 

Wheatley has satisfactorily proved that the use 
of pre-composed and appointed forms of prayer, 
was common in the Christian church from the days 



99 



of the apostles : several of these ancient Liturgies 
are still extant. The reformed churches in this, 
followed the example of the more primitive 
churches. That great reformer Calvin, thus ex- 
presses his opinion on this point : " I strongly re- 
commend that there should be a fixed form of 
prayer, and ecclesiastical rites, from which it 
should not be lawful for the pastors to depart, in 
the discharge of their office : there ought to be an 
established catechism — an established mode of 
administering the sacraments — and also a public 
form of prayer." — ( Calvini E pistol a Protectori 
Anglic?.) 

They who object to the use of a form of prayer 
in the public worship of God, overlook the fact, 
that in a somewhat different way they use a form 
of prayer. Using a form of prayer is, in other 
words, presenting our petitions to God in the words 
of another : this the worshipper in the meeting- 
house, who prays to God in the words of the 
minister, does as much as the member of the 
Church of England, who prays in the words of the 
Liturgy. Many dissenting ministers, who feel the 
importance of conducting this part of divine wor- 
ship with due solemnity and propriety, are accus- 
tomed to pre-compose, at least to arrange, the 
matter of their prayers to be offered up in public. 
The difference then is but slight, between praying 
in the authorized forms of the Liturgy, and pray- 
ing in the pre-composed forms of the minister, the 
state of whose mind, individual circiim stances, and 
the character of whose religion, may render his 
prayers ill-suited to the feelings and wants of the 



100 



assembled congregation whose devotions he has to 
lead. 

It is objected, that the Liturgy of the Church of 
England is a mere human composition. " Is not 
this use of the word human," asks one, " a mere 
play upon words, calculated to mislead the judg- 
ment ? It is taken for granted that human and 
divine are in direct opposition : then it is assumed 
that what man produces is human. But what is 
there which may not be exploded in this way ? 
How can you join in an extempore prayer any 
more than in a pre-composed form ? Is not the 
prayer in both cases, the prayer of man, though in 
both it may bear the savour of a fruit of the Spirit ?" 
They who on this ground object that it is unscrip- 
tural and unlawful to use pre-composed forms of 
prayer in the service of God, to be consistent, 
ought to abandon the use of pre-composed forms 
of praise. 

It is further objected, that the Liturgy abounds 
in vain repetitions. This objection overlooks the 
important distinction between a repetition and a 
vain repetition. The latter, our Lord forbids and 
condemns ; while for the former, our Lord's own 
conduct, and the authority of holy Scripture, may be 
pleaded. In the 136th Psalm, the phrase " His 
mercy endureth for ever" is repeated twenty-six times 
in the compass of so many verses. If the repetition 
of the same petitions subjects to this charge, then 
did our Lord use vain repetitions in praying again 
the third time, saying " the same words" (Matt, 
xxvi. 44.) The frequent repetition of the Lord's 
Prayer in the morning service, is accounted for 



101 



from the fact that the morning prayers and the 
Litany were originally designed to be used at 
different times : this will also account for the 
length of the morning service, of which many 
complain. 

It has been urged also as an objection, that the 
prayers of the Church of England have, for the 
most part, with slight alterations, been taken from 
the Missal of the Church of Rome. This is not 
true, at least to the extent objected. Dr. Stiiling- 
fleet, in his " Origines Britannicaa," has clearly 
shown that the Church of England has not followed 
the Church of Rome, but the consent of all the 
ancient churches, in the construction of her offices. 
At the close of the chapter in which he treats on 
this point, the Doctor observes, " From which it 
will appear that our Church of England hath 
omitted none of those offices wherein all the ancient 
churches, agreed ; and that when the British, or 
Gallican, and Roman differed, our church hath not 
followed the Roman, but the other ; and therefore 
our dissenters do unreasonably charge us with 
taking our offices from the Church of Rome." 

" To me," says Dr. Milner, 4f it appears to be 
an advantage, that our reformers followed antiquity 
so much in the work. The purification of the 
ancient services from the corrupt and idolatrous 
mixtures of Popery, was as strong an indication of 
their judgment, as the composition of prayers, 
altogether new, could have been ; which, however, 
they scrupled not to introduce in various parts of 
the Liturgy. It appears that the service of our 
church is far more ancient than the Roman missal, 
k2 



102 



properly speaking. And whoever has attended to 
the superlative simplicity, fervour, and energy of 
the prayers, and of the collects particularly, will 
have no hesitation in concluding that they must 
have been composed in a time of true evangelical 
light and godliness. It is impossible, indeed, to 
say how early some parts of the Liturgy were 
written ; but doubtless they are of very high 
antiquity. Many persons in dark times, and under 
the disadvantage of slothful, ignorant pastors, have 
been enlightened and nourished through their 
medium : and not a few, I trust, of my readers can 
justly confess with me how much their devotion has 
been assisted by the public use of them." 

In public prayers, the most sacred part of divine 
worship in which the assembled congregation unite, 
there appears a special propriety that they should 
previously know 7 the petitions which they are about 
to present to the Majesty of heaven. Without this, 
how can they " agree on earth as touching an}' 
thing that they shall ask," so as to warrant the 
confidence that u it shall be done for them of my 
Father which is in heaven ?" (Matt, xviii. 19.) 
" If," says the pious Bishop Beveridge, " I hear 
another pray, and know not beforehand what he 
will say, I must first listen to what he will say 
next. Then I am to consider whether w T hat he 
saith be agreeable to sound doctrine, and whether 
it be proper and lawful for me to join with him in 
the petitions he puts up to Almighty God ; and if 
I think it so, then I am to do it ; but before I can 
well do that, he has got to another thing." Such 
extempore prayers, in which a congregation 



103 



unites, may partake of the inexperience, the errors 
and other infirmities of the minister; they may 
indicate a state of feeling in which his people 
cannot sympathize ; they may be wanting in that 
comprehension and adaptation which alone can 
render them appropriate to the feelings and circum- 
stances of those on whose behalf they are offered to 
God. There may be that character of novelty 
about such prayers so agreeable to superficial wor- 
shippers, the want of which is objected to a form : 
but novelty so eagerly desired, is no characteristic 
of genuine devotion : for it has been well observed, 
" We do not want so much new words, as new 
affections of the heart excited, not by new words, 
but by ' the Spirit of grace and supplication/ in 
order to worship in e spirit and in truth.' " 

The Liturgy of the Church of England combines 
in it all that renders it of universal adaptation ; and 
when read with due solemnity, it has not only 
excited the devotional feelings of the congregation, 
but has proved, as it has been often called, the 
best sermon that can be preached. 

It is no slight argument in favour of the use of 
the Liturgy, that it has been a means honoured of 
God of preserving scriptural truth in the church, 
and of diffusing it most extensively and successfully 
over the nation ; whereas in many religious so- 
cieties, once orthodox, for want of such a standard 
of scriptural truth, there has been a most awful 
apostacy from the faith once delivered to the saints. 

The writer will conclude his observations on this 
subject in the words of an esteemed author, from 
whom he has before quoted. 



104 



?f When men are unconscious of their wants, or 
insensible of their obligations, I believe there will 
be a good deal of formality in their religious 
homage, whether they pray with a written form or 
without one ; and in this respect, I apprehend, the 
charge of formality may be pretty equally divided 
between the two. But where a truly spiritual 
frame ot mind is previously possessed, I have never 
found any thing in our Liturgy to deaden that 
feeling, or to restrain the strongest emotions of the 
mind. On the contrary, every part of it has 
served to deepen humility, to encourage hope, and 
to elevate devotion. I do not conceive that acci- 
dental visitors of different places of worship are 
best qualified to give an opinion of the spirituality 
of each other's services ; and it may be that others 
have left the service of our church with similar 
impressions to those which I have myself felt when 
leaving theirs; but I must say, (as indeed I have 
heard many others assert of their own feelings,) 
that I have seldom listened to the addresses which 
were presented to the throne of the divine Majesty 
in dissenting congregations, without being thank- 
ful for our Liturgy : and this fact, I think, proves 
that formality has no necessary, or even natural, 
alliance with prescribed Liturgies." 



105 



CHAPTER II. 

The Baptismal Service. 

One of the principal objections against the Church 
of England, and which is most frequently urged 
in justification of dissent, is founded on the use of 
certain expressions and rites enjoined in her bap- 
tismal formulary. It is said, that " the Church of 
England teaches that baptism is regeneration" 
The writer is aware that dissenters alone do not 
object to those expressions referred to, but that the 
propriety of the expressions is matter of serious 
doubt to some pious ministers and members of the 
church. Though he despairs of removing every 
doubt on this subject, he submits to the candid 
consideration of his readers, those views which 
have satisfied his own mind on this disputed point. 

Three things are premised, which, having been 
overlooked, have occasioned much of the difficulty 
which has been felt by some, in reconciling what 
the church teaches in her baptismal formulary 
with the word of God, 

1. The doctrine of the Church of England on 
this subject is not to be determined by a few inci- 
dental and charitable expressions which we meet 



106 



with in the service in question, but by what she 
propounds when she teaches more formally in her 
articles on this point. 

2. There is a peculiarity in the language which 
the church uses in her formularies, which is mis- 
understood ; the accordance of which with Scrip- 
ture will presently be shown. She assumes that 
her members are what they profess to be, and 
what indeed their Christian profession obliges them 
to be. This hypothetical and charitable language 
pervades all her offices. 

3. It is extremely probable that the term regene- 
ration is employed in the baptismal office, in a 
sense, which though different from that in which it is 
used by many in the present day, is the ancient 
and more correct sense. 

It is positively objected to the Church of Eng- 
land, that she teaches that " baptism is regenera- 
tion" The writer is aware that many pious clergy- 
men, regarding baptism as an ordinance of God, be- 
lieve that a special blessing attends on the adminis- 
tration of it, in answer to the faith and prayers of 
those who are active in it. And who is pi 
that under such circumstances the benefit implored 
and hoped for, cannot, and is not, imparted ? In- 
fancy forms no barrier either to the communication 
or reception of regenerating grace, to that Al- 
mighty Spirit, who can, and in many instances does, 
operate on the minds of infants, as well as on those 
of more mature age. If this be not admitted, then 
do pious parents err, who pray and hope that God 
will sanctify their offspring from the womb. What 
is so possible and probable a case, it is certainly 
charitable to assume is the case, in respect of every 



107 



infant who has by faith and prayer been dedicated 
to God in baptism. This view of the matter alone 
is sufficient, the writer thinks, to justify the lan- 
guage which the church enjoins her ministers to 
use on such interesting occasions. 

That the church formally teaches that regenera- 
tion, in the sense objected, is conveyed by the 
mere act of baptism, that baptism is regeneration, 
or even inseparably connected with it, are allega- 
tions, capable of being disproved by an appeal to 
her articles, her catechism, and the writings of her 
reformers and martyrs. 

In the 25th Article (" of the Sacraments,") the 
church declares expressly, that "in such only as 
worthily receive the same they have a wholesome 
effect or operation." This will furnish us with a 
rule for interpreting the meaning of the church in 
other places. It is here manifestly implied that 
the sacraments may be so received, as to have no 
wholesome effect or operation in those receiving them. 

In the 27th Article, the church more fully ex- 
presses her belief respecting baptism : " Baptism 
is not only a sign of profession and mark of diffe- 
rence, whereby Christian men are discerned from 
others that be not christened ; but it is also a sign 
of regeneration, or new birth : whereby, as by an 
instrument, they that receive baptism rightly are 
grafted into the church : the promises of forgive- 
ness of sin, and of our adoption to be the sons of 
God by the Holy Ghost, are visibly signed and 
sealed, faith is confirmed, and grace increased by 
virtue of prayer to God. The baptism of young 
children is in any wise to be retained in the church 



108 



as most agreeable with the institution of Christ." 
The latter clause shows that this article had more 
particularly in view the case of those baptized in 
adult age, though by mentioning young children 
in this supplementary clause, the church does not 
overlook them, in what she here propounds res- 
pecting baptism. 

On this article, Mr, Scott, the commentator, 
remarks : " Baptism is said to be the sign of re- 
generation ; but the sign and the thing signified 
are not the same, no, nor even inseparably con- 
nected." The promises of the forgiveness of sin 
and of our adoption " are visibly signed and 
sealed, not efficaciously bestowed. The expression, 
"they that receive baptism rightly," refers not to 
the right administration of baptism by the priest, 
but to the right reception of it by the baptized 
person. As faith is in this case confirmed, and 
grace increased, faith and grace must have been 
previously possessed by " those who receive bap- 
tism rightly ;" for if they had no faith or grace, 
the one could not be confirmed, or the other in- 
creased. And this is not merely by the opus 
operation of baptism, but " by the virtue of 
prayer."* 

* Tt is strange that the Church of England should be 
accused of Popery in what she propounds on the doc- 
trine of baptism, seeing it is her manifest design in her 
articles on the sacraments to guard and protest against 
the popish doctrine of the efficacy of sacraments ! They 
who thus misrepresent the Church of England are surely 
in ignorance of what Popery on this subject is. The 
Church of Rome teaches that sacraments " confer grace.''' 
The council of Trent decreed as follows — K If any one 



109 



In consistency with her articles, is what the 
church teaches in her catechism. " What is the 
outward and visible sign or form of baptism ?' 7 

shall say the sacraments of the new law do not contain 
the grace which they signify, or do not confer the grace 
itself on those who oppose no obstructions to it, let him 
be accursed." — " If any one shall say that by the sacra- 
ments them selves, /row the performance of the work {ex 
opere operato) grace is not conferred, but that faith only 
in the divine promise is sufficient to the obtaining of 
grace, let him be accursed." (Trident, Con.Sess. vii., c. v. 
vi,) Thus regeneration and grace are made to depend 
upon, and represented as inseparably connected with, 
the administration and reception of baptism. Let any 
unbiassed reader compare with this the doctrine of the 
Church of England on the efficacy and design of sacra- 
ments, and then say whether there is any ground for such 
mistatements as the following, contained in dissenting 
publications : — " Both," i e. the Churches of Rome and 
England, " consider baptism a real regeneration : by 
their ceremony the subjects are made members of Christ,' 
&c. (Tract, Popery of the Church of England.) It is 
not true, as represented in most dissenting publications, 
that the Church of England connects the efficacy of 
sacraments with the due administration of them : on the 
contrary, she declares, " in such only as worthily re- 
ceive the same they have a wholesome effect or opera- 
tion (Art. xxv. ;) and this she expressly says, is, "by 
virtue of prayer to God." (Art. xxvii,) As the judicious 
Hooker remarks, " they (sacraments) are not physical, 
but moral instruments of salvation — for all receive not 
the grace of God who receive the sacraments of his 
grace. Neither is it ordinarily his will to bestow the 
grace of sacraments on any but by the sacraments, 
which grace also, they that receive by sacraments, or 
with sacraments, receive it from him, and not from 
them." 

The reader may see this subject treated more fully 
L 



110 



Answer. " Water, wherein the person is baptized," 
&e. " What is the inward and spiritual grace ?" 
Answer. <f A death unto sin, and a new birth unto 
righteousness ; for being by nature born in sin, and 
the children of wrath, we are hereby [i. e. by a 
death unto sin and a new birth unto righteous- 
ness) made the children of grace." 

Many quotations might here be given from the 
writings of the fathers of the Christian church, as 
confirming this view of what the Church of Eng- 
land teaches on the subject of baptism. The writer 
prefers, however, giving the opinions of some of 
the English reformers, whose views of scripture 
doctrine and of the sacraments, are embodied in 
the articles and formularies of the Established 
Church. 

John Frith, (martyr.) " The outward sign 
doth neither give us the Spirit of God, neither yet 
grace, that is, the favour of God." 

Archbishop Cranmer, though he uses language 
expressive of his belief that the inward and spiritual 
grace was attendant on baptism, yet is it equally 
clear, he did not suppose that in all cases they 
were inseparable. " As in baptism," he says, 
" those who come feignedly and those that come 
unfeignedly, both be washed with the sacramental 
water; but both be not washed with the Holy 
Ghost" &c. 

and the protest of the Church of England against the 
Popish doctrine of the efficacy of sacraments, more at 
large exhibited, in " The Church of England a faithful 
Witness," &c. Part II. c. I. 



Ill 



" Bishop Latimer, (martyr,) quoting our Lord's 
saying, " Except a man be born again from above* 
he cannot see the kingdom of God," observes, "He 
must have regeneration ; " and what is this regene- 
ration ? It is not to be christened in water, (as 
these firebrands— Papists — expound it,) and no- 
thing else. How is it to be expounded then ? 
St. Peter showeth that one place of Scripture ex- 
pounded another. St. Peter, " We be born 
again." How ? Not by a mortal seed, but by 
an immortal. What is this immortal seed ? By 
the word of the living God. By the word of God 
preached and opened. Thus cometh in our new 
birth: 

Bishop Hooper, (martyr.) " A traitor may 
receive the crown, and yet be true king nothing 
the more ; so a hypocrite and infidel may receive 
the external sign of baptism, and yet be no Chris- 
tian man any the more, as Simon Magus and 
others." 

Similar quotations might be given from others 
of the reformers of the English Church, but those 
given above are sufficient. Extracts equally de- 
cisive, and in accordance with those from the re- 
formers, might be made from those modern and 
eminent divines of the church, Hooker, Beveridge, 
Barrow, and Tillotson, &c. 

Why, then, it will be demanded, does the church, 
in certain of her formularies, enjoin her ministers 
to declare persons baptized, regenerated P In 
reply, we refer to that peculiarity in the language 
which the church uses in all her formularies. She 
declares hypothetically and charitably. The church ' 



112 



assumes that by virtue of faith and prayer to God, 
the blessing has been granted ; she assumes also 
in other services, that the professions made havebeen 
sincerely made, and therefore charitably pronounces 
accordingly, A reference to the three services in 
which the minister is directed to declare the 
baptized regenerated will illustrate and confirm 
this remark. 

In " the baptism of such as are of riper years," 
the rubric enjoins the minister, before he baptizes 
adults, to take " due care for their examination, 
whether they be sufficiently instructed in the prin- 
ciples of the Christian religion ; and that they may 
be exhorted to prepare themselves with prayer and 
fasting for the receiving of this holy sacrament." 
The congregation present at the administration of 
the sacrament are exhorted to pray that the persons 
to be baptized "may be baptized with water and 
the Holy Ghost." The adults to be baptized, are 
required to profess their renunciation of sin, Satan, 
and the world, their belief in the Christian faith, 
their readiness to be baptized in it, and their pur- 
pose " obediently to keep God's holy will and com- 
mandments, and to walk in the same all the days 
of their lives." The church believing that the 
prayers offered on the behalf of such have been 
sincere and accepted — that the vows made by such 
before God and his congregation, have also been 
sincerely made, declares such to be "regenerate 
and grafted into the body of Christ's church." And 
how otherwise could the church pronounce, assum- 
ing as she does, seeing it is not her prerogative to 
search the heart ? 



113 



In the confirmation service, the bishop thus 
prays, " Almighty and ever-living God, who hast 
vouchsafed to regenerate these thy servants by 
water and the Holy Ghost," &c. This prayer is 
offered by the bishop after the persons to be con- 
firmed have solemnly renewed and pledged them- 
selves to perform their baptismal vows. It is as- 
sumed that this renewal of baptismal vows has been 
sincere, and on that ground the affirmation of such 
being regenerate is charitably made. 

It is the same in the baptism of infants. The 
church speaks of this as a " charitable work," in 
pronouncing infants baptized, " regenerated by 
God's Holy Spirit," the church acts and declares 
on the same charitable supposition, which pervades 
the language of all her formularies. A writer 
before quoted remarks, " The parents of those who 
bring infants to be baptized as members of the 
church, are supposed in our offices, to be them- 
selves true Christians ; it is assumed that they 
really desire and pray for " the inward and spiritual 
grace" of baptism, both at other times, and when 
the child is about to be baptized ; that ihey come 
as those did who brought their young children to 
Christ, that he should lay his hands on them and 
pray over them, or bless them. It is assumed also, 
that when baptism is publicly administered, the 
congregation unites in fervent prayer to the same 
effect ; and they take it for granted that God hears 
and answers these prayers, and return him thanks for 
so doing. This seems a general view of the doc- 
trine implied in the baptismal offices of our church." 

l2 



114 



What is there to forbid a Christian parent under 
such circumstances to cherish, or the Christian 
minister to express, this hope or persuasion ? The 
covenant promise is the same to believers under 
the New Testament, as it was under the Old ; " to 
be a God to them and their seed." (Actsii. 39.) 
Christians are under the same covenant, the sign 
or seal of which alone has been changed, baptism 
having taken the place of circumcision. (Col. ii. 
11.) The believing Christian, equally with the 
believing Jew, is warranted by the faithful promise 
of his God, to cherish the assurance that his child 
receiving its appointed sign or seal, is within " the 
bond of the covenant," is a child of God, incor- 
porated into the church, and made a partaker of its 
privileges. It will not be doubted that infants are 
capable of spiritual regeneration and of saving 
grace. We cling to this persuasion and derive 
comfort from it, in the case of those who die in 
infancy : what is there to forbid our cherishing the 
same persuasion concerning infants who live, that 
we do of such as die in childhood ? The language 
of our Lord warrants this, when he says, " Suffer 
the little children to come unto me, and forbid 
them not : for of such is the kingdom of God." 
(Mark x, 14.) "It is right," says one, "in 
bringing our children to the font, that we should 
pray, that we should hope, that we should believe. 
It is right that the services of the church should be 
framed on a supposition, that the utmost which 
can be granted is granted : or they would be poor, 
defective, and unsatisfactory. Let us, then, in 
bringing our children to Christ in baptism, hope 



the most rather than the least. It should be a 
matter of faith throughout." Even admitting a 
case, which may be objected to what has been 
stated, that some parents bring their children for 
baptism carelessly and without faith and prayer ; 
yet, may not God bestow the blessing in answer to 
the faith and prayers of the minister and of the 
congregation ? Are we not assured, that (e the 
effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth 
much?" (James v. 16.) If by some too much 
has been made of baptism, it is no less manifest 
that others have made too little account of it : 
they have lowered it to a mere ceremony, instead 
of using it by faith as a means of grace and an or- 
dinance of God, with which, as in the case of 
every ordinance of his appointment, he has con- 
nected spiritual blessings. In respect of this sa- 
crament, God might demand of many Christians, 
" How is it that ye have no faith ?" 

This charitable and hypothetical language of the 
church respecting her visible members, so con- 
demned, appears to be in accordance with the 
language of the sacred writers. The visible 
churches to whom apostles addressed their epistles, 
embraced as members all the baptized. These 
are, without exception, addressed in terms expres- 
sive of exalted privileges and of great moral ex- 
cellence, on the supposition that they were such as 
their profession and relation to the church of 
Christ obligated them to be. Bishop Bradford, in 
" A Discourse concerning Baptismal and Spiritual 
Regeneration," makes the following apposite re- 
marks : — " It is the way of the Scriptures to speak 



116 



to and of the visible members of tbe church of 
Christ under such appellations and expressions as 
may seem, at first hearing, to imply that they are 
all of them truly righteous and holy persons. 
Thus the apostles style those to whom they write 
in general, e saints speak of them as ' sanctified 
in Christ Jesus,' e chosen of God,' ( buried with 
Christ by baptism, risen again with him from the 
dead, sitting with him in heavenly places and 
particularly St. Paul says, they were 'saved by 
the washing of regeneration ; the reason of which 
is, that they were visibly, by obligation and pro- 
fession, all this, which was thus represented by 
them, the more effectually to stir them up, and 
engage them to live according to their profession 
and obligation." 

Our Lord, referring to baptism, speaks of the 
person baptized, as " born again of water" St. 
Paul speaks of the children of believing parents as 
holy; "Now are they holy" (1 Cor. vii. 34.) 
With such authority, shall the church be con- 
demned for using a similar phraseology ? " We 
speak of infants," says the judicious Hooker, " as 
the rule of piety alloweth both to speak and think. 
They that can take to themselves, in ordinary talk, 
a charitable kind of liberty, to name men of their 
own sort, ' God's dear children,' (notwithstanding 
the large reign of hypocrisy,) should not, methinks, 
be so strict and rigorous against the church for 
presuming as it doth of a Christian Innocent." 

There is a lower sense than that hitherto con- 
sidered, in which the term regeneration is supposed 
to have been used in the offices of the Church of 



117 



England. It has been contended, that the com- 
pilers of the formularies of the church, employed 
the term regeneration in its old and ecclesiastical 
sense ; as importing, not that great moral change 
which infallibly produces faith and holiness, hut 
that change of state which ensues on baptism ; 
that they used the terms regeneration and regene- 
rated in the same sense in which they had been 
uniformly employed borh in the Jewish church and 
in the first ages of the Christian church in re- 
ference to baptism. 

Baptism was no new religious ordinance when 
introduced into the Christian church. Lightfoot 
and Wall, by their learned researches, have estab- 
lished the fact beyond the power of contradiction , 
that when Pagans became proselytes to Judaism, 
they, with their young children) were introduced 
into the Jewish church by baptism. Such prose- 
lytes, with their children, so baptized, were spoken 
of as new horn and regenerated. By their bap- 
tism, they were considered to have been sanctified 
to God, brought within the bond of the covenant, 
introduced into a new state, and regarded as hence- 
forth standing in a new relation to God and his 
people. When our Lord, then, in his conversation 
with Nicodemus, speaks of a person's being " born 
again of water," in baptism, he used a phraseology 
which it had been long customary to use in the 
Jewish church, in describing the same ordinance. 
That the Jewish Rabbi did not apprehend our 
Lords meaning when he insisted on the necessity 
of being born again, is easily accounted for, The 
Jews, as a people, looked upon themselves as holy. 



118 



and therefore as not needing that baptismal sancti- 
fi cation or regeneration required in the case of a 
Pagan proselyte. Our Lord insisting on this in 
reference both to Jew and Gentile, as the medium 
of introduction into the Christian church, and its 
exalted privileges, was what staggered Nicodemus. 
When Nicodemus, not apprehending our Lord's 
meaning as to being " born again," took the words 
in a literal sense, Christ spoke plainer, and in- 
sisted on the necessity of every one introduced into 
the gospel church and its exalted privileges, being 
" born of water and of the Holy Ghost," at the 
same time expressing his surprise, seeing it was 
customary to use this phrase to describe baptism, 
that he, being a teachei in Israel, had not under- 
stood his meaning. 

The expression of our Lord's, just referred to, 
was literally understood by the fathers of the Chris- 
tian church as applying to baptism : hence, in the 
writings of those fathers, the terms regeneration 
and regenerated, are used as synonymous with 
baptism ; in the same way as we now use the terms 
christen or christened, to describe the same sacra- 
ment. In their views, baptism was not a mere 
ceremony ; they used and reverenced it as a divine 
ordinance, by which the baptized were introduced 
into a new state of privileges — into a new relation 
to God and his church. In this use of the term 
regeneration, to designate baptism, they were jus- 
tified not only by the language of our Lord, which 
they understood in this sense, but also by the lan- 
guage of St. Paul, who, referring to baptism, calls 
it " the washing of regeneration" (Titus iii. 5.) 



119 



In this ancient and more correct sense, as desig- 
nating baptism and its privileges, the term regene- 
ration appears to have been retained by the com- 
pilers of our church offices.* 

Bishop Hopkins observes — " Baptism is the im- 
mediate means of our external and relative sancti- 
fication unto God." From hence the Bishop 
argues, — et That those who are baptized, may, in 
this ecclesiastical sense, be truly called saints, the 
children of God, and members of Christ, and 
thereupon inheritors of the kingdom of heaven. 
Doubtless, so far forth, baptism is a means of sanc- 
tification, as it is the solemn admission of persons 
into the visible church ; as it separates them from 
the world, and from all false religions in it, and 
brings them out of the visible kingdom of the 
devil, into the visible kingdom of Jesus Christ. ,, 

To this view, the Bishop supposes it will be 
objected, that the baptismal formulary declares the 
baptized " regenerated by the Holy Spirit" To 
this his Lordship thus replies : — " They are re- 
generated as they are incorporated into the church 
of Christ ; for this is called regeneration " Ye 
tvhich have folloived me in the regeneration " 
(Matt. xix. 28,) i. e. in planting my church, 
which is the renewing of the world. To be ad- 
mitted, therefore; by baptism into the church of 
Christ, is to be admitted into the state of regenera- 
tion, or the renewing of all things. But how then 
are infants said in baptism to be regenerated by 

* et Grant that we being regenerate, and made thy 
children by adoption and grace, may daily be renewed 
by thy Holy Spirit, &c." — Collect for Christmas Day. 



120 



the Holy Spirit, if he doth not inwardly sanctify 
them in and by that ordinance ? I answer, because 
the whole economy and dispensation of the king- 
dom of Christ is managed by the Spirit of Christ ; 
so that those who are internally sanctified, are 
regenerated by his effectual operation : and those 
who are only externally sanctified, are regenerated 
by his public institution. Infants, therefore, are 
in baptism regenerated by the Holy Ghost, because 
the Holy Spirit of God appoints this ordinance to 
receive them into the visible church, which is the 
regenerate part and state of the world." 

The practice of requiring sponsors at the bap- 
tism of a child, as also the use of the sign of the 
cross after baptism, are objected to, and condemned 
as of Popish origin. A few remarks on each of 
these are, therefore, deemed necessary. 

The practice of requiring sponsors at the baptism 
of a child, was known in the Jewish church long 
before the Christian era, and therefore had not its 
origin in Popery. It is a remarkable fact, which 
Mr. Wall, in his history of Infant Baptism, has 
clearly shown, that the Jews baptized the infant of 
a proselyte, upon the profession of the house of 
judgment, " according to their law of baptism, 
which requires three men, who do so become to him 
a father, and he is by them made a proselyte," &c. 
Mr. Wall quotes theiearned Seidell's (de Synedriis) 
remarks on this law : " A proselyte, if of age, made 
profession to the court, that he would keep Moses* 
law : but in the case of minors, the court itself did 
profess, in their name, the same thing. Just as 
in the Christian church the godfathers do" &c. 



121 



Tertullian, who lived about one hundred years 
after the apostles, and long before the papacy, in- 
cidentally mentions the sponsors of baptized 
infants, as an ordinary practice in the church. 
The usual practice, then, was for parents to answer 
for their children, though others, in certain cases, 
performed this charitable work for them, and of 
bringing up their children religiously. This prac- 
tice appears to have originated in a holy solicitude 
of securing the religious education of the child. 
" The entrusting the child," says an excellent 
writer, " to the spiritual care of the sponsor is, in 
fact, the work of the church, who says to every 
sponsor, as Pharaoh's daughter did to the mother 
of Moses, e take this child away, and nurse it for 
me.' The church considers the character of the 
parent as represented by the sponsor : his cha- 
racter, as interpreted by his profession, and the 
office which he voluntarily undertakes before the 
congregation, is her security, under God, for the 
spiritual education of the infant. To him she 
commits her charge : he voluntarily accepts the 
responsibility : and that she may not be disap- 
pointed in her hope, by the death or default of the 
parties, she appoints three sponsors to every child 
she receives."* 

It is most deeply to be deplored, that so many 
should take upon them the solemn responsibility 
of sponsors, without due consideration, and serious 
anxiety, to discharge the weighty duties involved 
in such an engagement. The church having 

* See an admirable work on Infant Baptism, by the 
Hev. H. Budd, A.M. 
M 



122 



exacted from sponsors all the pledges of fidelity in 
her power, and solemnly exhorted them to the 
performance of their duties, is not responsible 
for their guilty neglect of them. It is to this neg- 
lect of sponsorial vows, it may be traced, that this 
part of the baptismal institute is so degraded, in 
the opinion of those who dissent from the Esta- 
blished Church. To guard against this neglect of 
sponsorial engagements, the church has ordained, 
(and greatly is it to be wished that what she so en- 
joins was more generally regarded,) " neither shall 
any person be admitted godfather or godmother to 
any child at christening or confirmation, before the 
said person so undertaking hath received the holy 
comm union," — ( T wen ty -ninth canon . ) 

The sign of the cross, after baptism, has also 
been objected to as of Popish origin. The church 
has been unfairly and incorrectly charged as 
making use of the sign of the cross in baptism, 
and as making it an essential part of baptism. 
This simple and expressive rite was used in the 
church long before the rise of the papacy, and is . 
not, therefore, of Popish origin ; and as an ancient 
and significant ceremony, was retained by the 
reformers, In her thirtieth canon, the church 
thus declares the true use of this ceremony. 

" First — The Church of England, since the 
abolishing of Popery, hath ever held and taught, 
and so doth hold and teach still, that the sign of 
the cross used in baptism, is no part of the sub- 
stance of that sacrament : for when the minister, 
dipping the infant in water, or laying water upon 
the face of it, (as the manner also is,) hath pro- 



123 



nounced these words/ 1 baptize thee in the name/ 
&c, the infant is fully and perfectly baptized. So 
as the sign of the cross being afterwards used, doth 
neither add any thing to the virtue and perfection 
of baptism, nor being omitted, doth detract any 
thing from the effect and substance of it. 

" Secondly — It is apparent, in the Communion 
Book, that the infant baptized is, by virtue of bap- 
tism, before it be signed with the sign of the cross, 
received into the congregation of Christ's flock, as 
a perfect member thereof, and not by any power 
ascribed unto the sign of the cross. So that for 
the very remembrance of the cross, which is very 
precious to all them which rightly believe in Jesus 
Christ, and in the other respects mentioned, the 
Church of England hath retained still the sign of 
it in baptism : following therein the primitive and 
apostolic churches, and accounting it a lawful out- 
ward ceremony, and honourable badge, whereby 
the infant is dedicated to the service of him that 
died upon the cross, as by the words used in the 
Book of Common Prayer it may appear. 

" Lastly — The use of the sign of the cross in 
baptism, being thus purged from all Popish super- 
stition and error, and reduced in the Church of 
England to the primary institution of it, upon 
those true rules of doctrine concerning things 
indifferent, which are consonant to the word of 
God, and the judgment of all the ancient Fathers, 
we hold it the part of every private man, both 
minister and other, reverently to retain the true use 
of it prescribed by public authority ; considering 
that things, of themselves indifferent, do in some 



124 



sort alter their natures when they are either com- 
manded or forbidden by a lawful magistrate ; and 
may not be omitted at every man's pleasure, con- 
trary to the law, when they be commanded, nor 
used when they are prohibited/' 



(125) 



CHAPTER III. 

Absolution — Visitation of the Sick — Burial 
Service — Sacrament of the Lord's Supper. 

The observations offered in the former chapter, on 
the language of charitable supposition, which per- 
vades the services of the church generally, will 
assist in removing much of the misconception, as 
to the language and practice of the church, in those 
parts of her formularies specified at the head of 
this chapter. She supposes that the professions 
made, have been sincerely made, and therefore 
declares concerning, and acts towards, her members 
accordingly. Be it remembered, the church has 
not the prerogative of searching the heart ; she can 
only judge and act on the professions of those who 
attend on her ordinances : it is hers, as it is the 
duty of every Christian, to exercise that charity, 
which " hopeth all things, believeth all things," 
which do not involve in them what is impossible 
or contrary to the divine will. 

It is urged as a serious objection, that " the 
Church of England teaches that her ministers 
have power to absolve sins" The Church of 
Rome has so awfully abused this power, that Pro- 
lyl 



126 



iestants are afraid of every thing which has the 
semblance of it. That God alone has power to 
forgive sins, is a fundamental doctrine most clearly 
taught by the Church of England, and inculcated 
in those very forms of absolution, so objected 
against. The want of candour and truth, so mani- 
fest in this objection, will appear from a slight 
reference to the services of the church. 

At the beginning of morning and evening 
service, in scriptural language, the church declares, 
({ If we confess our sins, God is faithful and just 
to forgive us our sins." After a penitential con- 
fession of sin and prayer for mercy, by the congre- 
gation, the minister, in the form of absolution, 
says, " Almighty God, who hath given power aud 
commandment to his ministers, to declare andpro- 
nounce to hf^ people, being penitent , the absolution 
and remission of their sins :" and then immediately, 
to prevent the possibility of mistake, the minister 
adds, " He" i.e. God, and not the minister, " par- 
doneth and absolveth all them that truly repent," 
&c. Then it fellows, " wherefore, let us beseech 
him to grant us true repentance, and his Holy 
Spirit." Can any language more clearly or directly 
point to God alone as forgiving sin, than this ? The 
question, however, is, " Hath God given power and 
commandment to His ministers to declare and 
prouounce" to penitents, the forgiveness of their 
sins ? Did not the prophet Nathan exercise such 
a power, when he declared to penitent David, on a 
confession of his guilt, " The Lord hath put away 
thy sin ; thou shalt not die?" (2 Sam. xii. 13.) 
Did not God give power and commandment to 



127 



Isaiah, to speak " comfortably to Jerusalem, and 
cry unto her, Thy iniquity is pardoned." (Isaiah 
xl. 2.) And did not our Lord give such power to 
his apostles and ministers, when he said to them, 
" Whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto 
them ?" (John xx. 23.) Our Lord's meaning, 
as all judicious commentators agree, was simply, 
" Whose soever sins ye declare to be forgiven, they 
are forgiven." There is nothing, then, unscriptural 
or improper in the minister of Christ declaring 
and pronouncing to such as truly repent, the glad 
tidings that God has forgiven their sins. 

But the form of absolution most objected against 
is that which occurs in the service for the Visitation 
of the Sick. It is not a sufficient reply to say, that 
this service is but seldom used : the writer thinks 
that a proper use of it would, under a divine bless- 
ing, be the means of producing conviction of sin 
in those visited. In this service, the doctrine of 
divine forgiveness of sin is clearly stated : in the 
words of absolution, the minister acknowledges his 
inability to forgive sin, and prays, " Our Lord 
Jesus Christ forgive thee thy sins" Afterwards he 
again prays, " O God, impute not unto him his 
former sins" The minister, in this case, only is 
to be considered as declaring the absolution of sin, 
on the ground of the supposed sincere repentance 
of the sick person. If he thought that he had the 
power really to forgive sin, and that he had for- 
given it, why would he afterwards beseech God not 
to impute his sins to the sick persons ? The abso- 
lution, in this service, is not to be pronounced by 
the minister till after the sick person has been 



128 



examined, " whether he repent him truly of his 
sins, and he in charity with all the world ;" and 
has been " moved to make a special confession of 
his sins," &c. After this, "if he humbly and 
heartily desire it," the minister pronounces the 
words objected to. Is it not clear that the church 
supposes, what in such cases she has no right or 
ground to question, the sincerity of the repentance, 
faith, and charity, then professed by the sick 
person ? 

To assert that the Church of England teaches 
that her ministers have power to forgive sins, is 
not true. Her ministers, in declaring and pro- 
nouncing the absolution and remission of sins, to 
such as truly repent, do only what all ministers 
separate from the church do. Do not they, if not 
in the same words, yet to the same effect, assure 
true penitents of the pardon of their sins ? Would 
they fulfil their office, if they withheld these glad 
tidings from them that mourn in Zion ? 

We now come to the Service for the Burial of 
the Dead. There is no one of the offices of the 
church which has been more misconceived or mis- 
represented than this. On all hands , it is admitted, 
that as a composition, it is unparalleled for subli- 
mity, and for scriptural truth, and that read at the 
interment of a real Christian, it is most appropriate 
and affecting. The indiscriminate use of this fine 
service, at the interment of all, is what is consi- 
dered so objectionable, and much uncandid misre- 
presentation and colouring have been employed, on 
this account, to raise a prejudice against the church. 
On this ground, a highly talented dissenting mi- 



129 



nister says/' The Church of England teaches that 
all who die go to heaven, whatever was their pre- 
vious character'' In reply to this unfounded 
charge, a writer in the British Review says, " The 
Church of England, throughout her Articles, Li- 
turgy, and Homilies, teaches that none will go to 
heaven but the faithful and the holy ! It were 
easy to cover our pages with quotations from the 
whole Prayer Book ; we transcribe only one, instar 
omnium, from the Athanasian Creed : e they that 
have done good, shall go into everlasting life; and 
they that have done evil, into everlasting fire/ But 
in the f Burial Service' itself, to which the author 
of the ' Guide' refers, our church repeatedly 
teaches, that none but the faithful and holy can 
enter the kingdom of heaven. ' Blessed are the 
dead that die in the Lord.' e Almighty God, with 
whom do live the spirits of them that depart hence 
in the Lord, and with whom thesoulsof the faithful 
are in joy and felicity... we beseech thee... that we... 
with all those that are departed in the true faith, 
of thy holy name, may have our perfect consum- 
mation and bliss in thine eternal glory, through 
Jesus Christ our Lord.' s We meekly beseech 
thee, O Father, to raise us from the death of sin 
unto the life of righteousness, that when we shall 
depart this life, we may rest in Christ' Is it pos- 
sible that any man, who has ever read these passa- 
ges in our Burial Service, can deliberately write, 
print, and publish that the Church of England, in 
that service, ' teaches that all who die go to heaven, 
whatever was their previous character P" 

Another dissenting writer is still more severe and 



130 



unjust in his remarks on this service. In one of a 
series of Letters to an Episcopalian, he says, 
" Your church, not-satisfied with having contributed 
to deceive the dying, follows up the delusion to the 
very last : and at the interment attempts to deceive 
the living: excepting at the graves of the unbaptized, 
self-murderers, or those who have been excommu- 
nicated, the burial service is read in common over 
all persons, though they have lived the most de- 
bauched, profligate, and abandoned lives, and died 
obdurate infidels and atheists. In the service of 
which I speak, the clergyman calls the deceased, 
' our dear brother,' though while living he had been 

* of his father, the devil :' and then he expresses ( a 
sure and certain hope of his resurrection to eternal 
life/ and ' thanks God for having taken him out of 
the miseries of this sinful world.' He next prays, 

* that when we depart this life, we may rest in 
Christ, as our hope is this our brother doth, 
though his life afforded not the least reason to en- 
tertain any hope of his salvation." 

It is nut necessary to remark on the severity 
and want of candour, so manifest in this extract, 
which imputes to the church the intention of de- 
ceiving the dying and the living : the unfairness 
and dishonesty of it will appear from an examina- 
tion of the service itself. 

This service is marked by the same charitable 
language which pervades the whole of the offices of 
the church. She appoints it to be read at the 
burial of professed Christians ; in the judgment 
of charity, it is assumed, that all such are what 
they profess to be, with the exception of the un- 



131 



baptized, those who commit self-murder, or those 
who have been excommunicated. It is evident that 
such a state of discipline is supposed to exist in 
the church, that those over whom it would be im- 
proper to read this service are in a state of excom- 
munication. This will account for the language 
of the church at the interment of the dead. 

It is not true, however, as stated in the above 
extract, that the clergyman, in burying the de- 
ceased, expresses " a sure and certain hope of 
his resurrection to eternal life ; this is a misquo- 
tation and misrepresentation too common on this 
point. The words are, " We commit his body to 
the ground, in sure and certain hope of the resur- 
rection to eternal life words which describe the 
Christian hope generally, without any special re- 
ference to the individual then buried. A writer 
before quoted, remarks, " We commit the body to 
the ground, in sure and certain hope (not of his 
or her resurrection to eternal life, but) in general 
of " the resurrection to eternal life through Jesus 
Christ our Lord while in all the rest the pro- 
nouns are expressly appointed and marked. We 
bury a professed Christian, in sure hope of the re- 
surrection of all true Christians to eternal life; 
leaving the individual to the judgment of God, 
with only a general hope respecting him ; e as our 
hope is this our brother doth and in what ordi- 
nary cases would we say, / have no hope P" 

The truth of this represention is confirmed by a 
fact which Neale, the historian of the puritans, (an 
authority from which dissenters will not appeal) 
states, that at the revision of the offices of the 



132 



church at the Savoy Conference, the expression as 
it stood "before, " in sure and certain hope of re- 
surrection to eternal life," &c, was altered to " in 
sure and certain hope of the resurrection," &c, 
purposely to guard against the objection, now so 
unfairly urged against this part of the service. 

In expressing, then, a hope respecting a de- 
ceased fellow-creature — for it is nothing more — 
it is only the proper exercise of Christian charity. 
Every feeling and Christian mind impressed with 
the awful solemnity which connects with the depar- 
ture of an immortal soul into an eternal world, will 
delight to cherish such a hope. What though the 
life of the individual, as observed by us, furnished 
no evidence of personal piety, and in his last mo- 
ments no expressions dropped from his lips, on 
which we can reflect with satisfaction, there may 
have been solemn transactions between God and 
that soul on the very threshold of the eternal state, 
which, if we knew, would cause us to joy with 
angels over the deceased, as " a brand plucked 
from the fire." " Is any thing too hard for God ?" 
It would ill become us, such being the possibilities 
of the case, either in words, or by omissions, or by 
silence more expressive than words, to convey an 
unfavourable judgment respecting the eternal state 
of the departed ; and by so doing to send those 
who weep at the grave of a departed relative away, 
to " sorrow as those who have no hope."* 

* The writer will probably be reminded, that cases 
do occur of persons dying in the very act of sin, of 
swearing, drunkenness, uucleanness^nfidelity, &c. It 



133 



The next objection against the Established 
Church which claims our notice, respects the 

is asked, is it right to express the same hope respecting 
them, that we do of those whose state is less doubtful ? 
Such extreme cases, it is hoped, seldom occur. It is 
unfair to found on such cases an objection to the service 
in question, seeing it is hardly possible to frame a ser- 
vice of universal adaptation. In reply, however, to the 
question raised, the following remarks of Bishop Hoadly 
are offered for consideration 

" I do verily think, that a minister in the church of 
England is under no obligation to use these expressions 
over notorious, incorrigible, impenitent, adulterers, 
drunkards, blasphemers, murderers, or the like : nor 
ever likely to suffer the least inconvenience for omitting 
them. I design not by this to teach any persons to 
play with what ought to be sacred among Christians ; 
or to make light of declarations or subscriptions. I 
hope I am far from it ; and if what I now say cannot 
be demonstrated to be perfectly consistent with all the 
obligations a conforming minister is under, I here re- 
nounce it, as soon as I have said it. I desire then it 
may be considered, that the omission of these sentences, 
in such cases, is not contrary to the original design of 
the church, in prescribing this form; but more agreeable 
to it, than the using them. I find it almost unanimous- 
ly affirmed, by as great writers as any that have ap- 
peared in this cause, that this office supposes such 
discipline in the church, that all notorious and incor- 
rigible sinners should be excommunicated, and so inca- 
pable of this office, If this be so, and yet no such dis- 
cipline exercised, to what part of his charge, to what 
part of his vow, is he false, who either denies the office 
to those of whose acceptance with God there cannot be 
the least hope, or omits these expressions, which render 
this office so improper on such occasions ? I desire it 
may be remembered, that I am not now encouraging 
any persons to judge hardly of their neighbours ; but 
speak only of such cases where it is most apparent and 

N 



134 



practice of the church in the administration of 
the sacrament of the Lord's supper. It is said, 
the Church of England indiscriminately admits all 
who have heen haptized to the holy communion, 
and that thus " the ordinance of the Lord's supper 
is most horribly prostituted — most dreadfully 
profaned" 

undeniable, that there is no ground for the lowest de- 
gree of hope. Supposing therefore a man cut off in the 
midst of such sins, as adultery, blasphemy, swearing, 
drunkenness, without the least sign of repentance or ac- 
ceptance with God : were these expressions designed 
for him ? Can the canon which respects this, be sup- 
posed to command the use of this form any otherwise 
than as it was designed by the church } Do any of our 
governors, or did they ever, insist upon obedience to the 
letter of this canon in such cases ? Not as I know of ; 
and if they did, I should venture any penalty rather than 
obey ; because my conscience would not let me say 1 
hoped the dead person rests in Christ, when there cannot 
be the least ground for hope : and because I cannot re- 
concile such an obedience with the obligations I am 
under to the church. But as for omitting what was 
never intended by the church for such occasions, I could 
do it with a very easy conscience ; having by no vow, 
declaration, or subscription, as I apprehend, obliged my- 
self to the use of any thing against the plain intent of 
that church in which I minister. 5 ' 

If Dr. Hoadly be correct in the premises laid down in 
the above extract, it were greatly to be wished that the 
extent of a clergyman's discretion in the cases supposed 
was denned, as it is in the case of his debarring impro- 
per persons an approach to the Lord's Supper, where he 
is required within a given time to assign his reasons to 
his ordinary. This would prevent the abuse of minis- 
terial authority, and secure the conscientious minister 
against the consequences of it, to which otherwise he 
might be painfully liable. 



135 



The practice of dissenters generally, is to admit 
those only to a participation of the Lord's supper, 
whom they judge to be decidedly converted, or re- 
ligious characters. In many instances it is requi- 
red of the candidates for church communion, that 
they deliver verbally, or in writing, to the society 
whom they propose to join, a statement of their re- 
ligious belief and experience. In other instances, 
certain members of the society are delegated to 
examine the candidates as to their faith and piety, 
and report the result of such examinations to the 
society by whom they have been deputed, at their 
next church meeting, when the candidates for 
communion are admitted or rejected by the votes 
of a majority of the members present. In some 
dissenting societies, subscription or assent to cer- 
tain rules and articles of faith, is also required. 
The effect of such unseriptural tests or qualifica- 
tions for admission to the privileges of Christian 
communion and a participation of the Lord's Sup- 
per, is to throw obstacles and discouragements in 
the way of many sincere Christians, who through 
diffidence and timidity are unable to comply with 
what is required, and who consequently are debarred 
the benefit of a divine ordinance which would tend 
to their spiritual edification. Such regulations are 
not likely to secure the purity of Christian com- 
munion. It is not easy in such cases, seeing ad- 
mission depends on the votes of the majority, who 
are not always the best able to judge, to exclude 
the specious hypocrite, especially such as are pos- 
sessed of wealth and influence. Be it observed, 
also, that the minister, best competent to judge, as 



136 



to the fitness of the candidates who offer themselves 
has no authority at such meetings beyond that 
of his single vote ; and as must happen, he often 
finds himself under the painful necessity of an- 
nouncing in the kindest terms he can, to those 
whom he hopes the Lord has received, that the 
church of which he is pastor, has rejected them ! 
The writer makes this statement wilh pain — for 
the truth of it he can vouch — he would have spared 
it, but it is necessary to his argument. Is such a 
state of discipline or trial for church fellowship 
scriptural P A dissenting minister of considerable 
influence in his own body, having candidly ad- 
mitted that there is not one passage in the New 
Testament which distinctly asserts the admission 
of individuals into Christian communities to be 
the act of the church, (or society which they pro- 
pose to join), or describes the manner in which 
that admission was then practised, remarks, " It is 
perfectly consistent for a society of human origin, 
to say, ' We have our rules, and those who propose 
to come among us, must either submit to them, or 
withdraw their desire.' " But this is not seemly 
language for a Christian church. Christ is the 
head of the church — if our rules are plainly Christ's 
rules, then they are enforced by his authority and 
not ours. But if they are merely expedients of 
our own, then we are stepping out of our own ju- 
risdiction and assuming his, when we enact laws 
in his kingdom. 

To prescribe tests and require submission to 
certain rules, in order to enjoy the privilege of ad- 
mission to a Christian society and to the Lords 



137 



Sapper, which are not to be found in the New- 
Testament, is a singular inconsistency in those 
who profess to separate from the Church of Eng- 
land, on the ground of unscriptural impositions ! 

In deciding the question, who have a right to 
the privilege of partaking of the sacrament of the 
Lord's Supper, we must be determined by the 
practice of the Christian church in her earliest and 
best days. So far as we are able to collect from 
the scanty information we have of the practice of 
the apostolic churches, it appears that all who were 
baptized were considered as members of the church 
of Christ, and entitled to all its sacred ordinances ; 
and that those only were excluded from the full 
privileges of the Christian church who had disqua- 
lified themselves by gross immoralities and heresy, 
and who, by a godly discipline, had been excom- 
municated. On this point, a deceased amiable, 
and learned nonconforming minister,* referring to 
the practice of the apostolic times, says, — " All 
baptized adults undoubtedly partook of the Lord's 
Supper, which seems originally to have been ad- 
ministered as often as they assembled for Christian 
worship. I apprehend, therefore, as soon as bap- 
tized children discovered a capacity for compre- 
hending that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, and 
that he died for sinners, — on their declaration of 
such a belief, they would likewise be admitted to 
the Lord's Supper. It was certainly in the third 
century administered to them before they could 
speak; but this absurdity arose from a notion, 

* The Rev. S. Greathead, F.R.S. 
N 2 



13a 



which then commonly prevailed, that their parti- 
cipation of both these institutions was indispensable 
to their salvation. The children of Jewish con- 
verts would be likely to partake of the Lord's 
Supper at the same age as they first attended the 
Passover ; that is, when twelve years old. I sup- 
pose no age to have been fixed for their admission, 
their capacities and dispositions being always 
greatly diversified. I am aware that Scripture dis- 
tinguishes between commands of Christ, as to our 
ground of obedience. To partake of the Lord's 
Supper appears to me no less obligatory than to 
offer prayer and praise ; and to require no other 
capacity or disposition in the participant. The 
earlier every Christian habit can be rationally 
formed, the more stedfast a religious profession 
is likely to prove." 

Believing that the above statement correctly re- 
presents the practice of the apostolical church it 
appears to the writer that the practice of the Church 
of England, as it regards the administration of the 
Lord's Supper, is in strict accordance with it. She 
invites all baptized into the Christian faith, and 
who profess themselves Christians, to partake of 
the Holy Communion. She denies this privilege 
to such only as proclaim themselves unworthy of 
it, and who would have been denied it in the apos- 
tolic churches. 

So far is it from being true, that she indiscri- 
minately invites or admits all to this sacrament, or 
that, by her practice, she sanctions the most horri- 
ble prostitution and profanation of it; that she 
manifests the greatest solicitude to maintain its 



139 



sacred character, and to guard against its profana- 
tion. A reference to her articles, catechism, com- 
munion-service, and rubric, will show this. 

In the 29th Article she thus declares concerning 
those who use the Lords Supper unworthily : — 
" The wicked, and such as be void of a lively faith, 
although they do carnally and visibly press with 
their teeth (as St. Austin saith) the sacrament of 
the body and blood of Christ, yet in no wise are 
they partakers of Christ ; but rather, to their con- 
demnation, do eat and drink the sign or sacrament 
of so great a thing." 

In her Catechism, the church teaches what qua- 
lifications are required to a right participation of 
this sacrament :— " What is required of them who 
come to the Lord's Supper ?" Answer. " To exa- 
mine themselves, whether they repent them truly 
of their former sins, stedfastly purposing to lead a 
new life; have a lively faith in God's mercy 
through Christ, with a thankful remembrance of 
his death ; and be in charity with all men." 

When the minister gives warning for the cele- 
bration of the Holy Communion, he solemnly ad- 
monishes those whom he invites to the supper of 
the Lord, to consider its dignity — the peril of un- 
worthily receiving it — to examine themselves, that 
they may " come holy and clean to such a hea- 
venly feast, in the marriage garment required by 
God." At the time of the celebration of the Holy 
Communion, the church also, by her minister, 
warns those who come to the Lord's Supper of the 
great danger of receiving it unworthily. Thus 
anxiously and solemnly does the church guard 



140 



against that indiscriminate use and profanation of 
the Lord's Supper, which is most unjustly objected 
against her. 

We see the same in her Rubric : — <e So many 
as intend to be partakers of the Holy Communion, 
shall signify their names to the curate, at least 
some time the day before. And if any of those 
be an open and notorious evil liver, or have done 
any wrong to his neighbours, by word or deed, so 
that the congregation be thereby offended; the 
curate having knowledge thereof, shall call him, 
and advertise him, that in any wise he presume not 
to come to the Lord's table until he hath openly- 
declared himself to have truly repented, and 
amended his former naughty life, that the congre- 
gation may be thereby satisfied, which before were 
offended ; and that he hath recompensed the 
parties to whom he hath done wrong ; or at least 
declared himself to be in full purpose so to do, as 
soon as he conveniently may," &c. 

The church thus gives power to her ministers, 
to prevent the desecration of this holy ordinance. 
A conscientious minister of the Established Church 
has thus an advantage which the dissenting mi- 
nister has not. He can, as occasion demands, 
keep from the holy sacrament improper persons ; 
he is not destitute of ministerial power and autho- 
rity in such cases, as the pastor of a dissenting 
congregation, who has to await the decision of the 
society before an unworthy member can be expelled 
from the Lord's table, and whose sincere judgment 
respecting such an individual may be, after all, 
overruled by the partiality and votes of the majo- 



141 



rity. The rubric which invests the clergyman with 
his ministerial authority, guards against the abuse 
of it, by requiring that every minister so refusing 
any the communion, within a given time, u give an 
account of the same to the ordinary" 

The venerable commentator Scott, remarking on 
the rubric in this case, observes, — " It is indeed to 
be regretted, that this is so very seldom acted upon, 
yet it sometimes is ; and I will venture to affirm, 
in part from experience, that, in proportion as it is 
acted upon, a great part of the evil objected to our 
establishment on this ground, may be prevented, 
without having recourse to authoritative and legal 
excommunication. Where a pious and consistent 
clergyman (at least in a country parish) impar- 
tially proceeds in the method prescribed by the 
rubric, with mildness and firmness, he will not 
find many (if any) continuing to attend at the 
Lords table, after he has solemnly warned them 
not to presume to do so, unless they give sa- 
tisfactory proof of repentance and amendment, 
appealing to the rubric as his rule and authority in 
thus warning them. There are, indeed, cases in 
many congregations, in which a man, to act faith- 
fully, must venture painful consequences, which he 
ought to do without shrinking ; and this, indeed, 
too often proving a strong temptation, shows that 
the communion is not so pure as it might be ; but 
not that it is ' as impure as it can be/ And the 
objection even here lies against this or the other 
establishment, nay, generally, in great measure, on 
the ministers, and is not essential to the very 
nature of an establishment." 



142 



Sufficient has been advanced to vindicate the 
church against the uncandid charge of counte- 
nancing a most horrid profanation of the Lord's 
Supper. Those who assign as a reason for refusing 
communion with the Church of England, that they 
cannot unite at the sacrament with those whom 
they judge unworthy participants, ought to re- 
member the words of our Lord, — " Judge not, 
that ye be not judged and of St. Paul, — t€ Let 
every man prove his own work, for every man 
shall bear his own burden." " There is not," it 
has been observed, " tbe least syllable of proof, 
either from Scripture or reason, that the badness 
of some members of a church does defile the rest. 
Every man is charged to examine himself, and not 
another ; and it would be well if all would do so. 
For he that inquires seriously into his own sins, 
will find great cause to be humble and penitent ; 
but he that is curious to pry into the miscarriages 
of others, will be apt to be vain, proud, self-con- 
ceited, and censorious ; which will make him as 
unfit for the table of the Lord, as any of those 
faults which he so scornfully condemns in his 
neighbours, that he esteems himself and the ordi- 
nances of God polluted by their company." 

Horrid abuse of this holy ordinance prevailed in 
the church at Corinth, greater than ever has been 
cbarged against the Church of England : but did 
sincere Christians separate from the communion of 
the Corinthian church on that account ? — or did 
the apostle St. Paul enjoin them to do this p To 
separate from a church because of some evils, or 
improper members in it, would render separation 



143 



from all churches necessary ; for what one church 
is there on earth, in which the existence of some 
evils, and of unworthy members, is not to he 
found ? If this principle were acted on, it would 
interrupt all social worship, and banish from the 
earth " the communion of saints." 



( 144 ) 



CHAPTER IV. 

Power of the Church to appoint Rites and 
Ceremonies — The King's Supremacy in matters 
Ecclesiastical. 

A writer, treating on the influence of a party 
spirit, says, "In judging those who differ from us, 
there is danger of mistaking their meaning ; at- 
tributing to them such notions and sentiments, as 
they do not really entertain. These mistakes may- 
arise either from men's misinterpreting the expres- 
sions employed by others ; or reasoning from them 
in a different manner, so as to regard them as 
leading to conclusions, which the others do not 
admit: or from their associating in their own 
minds the sentiments professed, with others with 
which they have no necessary connexion, but 
which are supposed also to go along with them, 
and to be entertained by the same persons." 

In this unfair way has the Established Church 
been judged ; and in no instance is this more mani- 
fest, than in the condemnation so unhesitatingly 
pronounced against her, on account of the power 
and authority which she claims, and acknowledges 
in matters ecclesiastical. She is accused of usurp- 



145 



ing an authority, which is not only unscriptural, 
but which is equally derogatory to the glory of 
Christ, and the inalienable rights of conscience. 

This objection is founded on a misconception 
and partial statement of the twentieth article of 
the church, in which it is declared, that " the 
church hath power to decree rites and ceremonies, 
and authority in matters of faith." There is great 
unfairness and injustice in the way in which the 
article in question is usually brought forward. In 
most dissenting publications which the writer has 
looked into on the subject, (he does not recollect 
a single exception,) the first part of this article is 
only given, i. e. " The church hath power to decree 
rites and ceremonies, and authority in matters of 
faith" Those not accustomed to consult the Ar- 
ticles for themselves, are thus led to suppose that 
what, in fact, is only a part, is the whole of the 
article in question ; and thus a prejudice is raised 
against the church in the minds of multitudes, 
which a fair quotation of the whole article would 
have prevented. The subsequent clauses of the 
article, which explain and limit this power of the 
church, are ; " And yet it is not lawful for the 
church to ordain any thing that is contrary to 
God's word written, neither may it so expound one 
place of Scripture, that it be repugnant to another. 
Wherefore, although the church be a witness and 
keeper of holy writ, yet as it ought not to decree 
any thing against the same, so, besides the same, 
ought it not to enforce any thing to be believed for 
necessity of salvation." When the whole of what 
has been quoted is considered by an unprejudiced 
o 



146 



mind, what is there in this article to justify the 
following severe animadversions on it ? " Surely 
this belongs to that apostate hierarchy alone, 
which arrogates to itself absolute infallibility, and 
in the full confidence of the accuracy of its im- 
pious claims, proceeds to trample on all the rights 
of human beings, by prescribing what they are to 
believe, and fixing unalterably those rites by which 
the Deity is to be worshipped." 

Has the Church of God, the practice of which 
is recorded in the sacred Scriptures, exercised or 
sanctioned the exercise of such a power as that 
objected against the Church of England ? What 
was the case in the Jewish church ? If ever there 
was a church, whose mode and rites of worship 
were so fixed by God, as to make variation or 
addition by human appointments unlawful, it was 
the Jewish church. It is, however, matter of fact, 
that to the appointments of God, there were added 
other rites, which were of mere human origin. 
"The feast of dedication, and the synagogue ser- 
vice, had no warrant in the law of Moses, and yet 
our Saviour sanctioned both by his presence, 
though he had blamed and detected, in more than 
one instance, departures from the spirit of the 
Mosaic law. If such was the case with the 
Jewish church, we may justly conclude, that sanc- 
tioning the rules of the church, by the authority of 
the state, is not in itself a violation of the order of 
a Christian church.*' 

If we come to the New Testament, we discover 
the exercise of the same authority in matters of 
failh, and in the appointment of the circumstantials 



147 



of Christian worship. Did not the Council of 
Jerusalem, consisting of apostles and elders,, 
exercise such power, in matters Drought before 
them ? (Acts xv. 6 — 23.) When Titus was 
sent to Crete, to "set in order the things that were 
wanting," it must imply a discretionary power to 
lay down such rules as the circumstances of the 
churches there required. Without insisting on 
particular facts, it is sufficient to observe, that the 
rules given by the apostles, such as these, " Let 
all things be done decently and in order," " Let 
all things be done to edification" while they fix 
the limits, clearly recognize a discretionary power 
in the church in after times, to order the mere 
circumstantials of church government and worship, 
as circumstances might require. 

The student of church history cannot fail to have 
remarked the exercise of this power of the church 
in all succeeding ages; as also the deference which 
was yielded to it by Christians In those ages, 
when the exercise of this authority of the church 
was confined within the just limits laid down in 
the twentieth article, it was one important means 
of checking the growth of heresy, and of preserving 
the unity of the church. It was when this authority 
was stretched beyond its just limits, by the Church 
of Rome, it proved subversive of the faith, and in- 
jurious to the church. 

The position maintained by some, that whatever 
is not enjoined in the New Testament is forbidden, 
and therefore 'unlawful to be appointed or ob» 
served; if true, would render obligatory on us 
every custom which obtained in the apostolic 



148 



churches, We find in the first Christian churches, 
among other customs an equality of goods — the 
kiss of charity — the Agapee, or love-feasts — wash- 
ing one another's feet — weekly celebrations of the 
Lord's Sapper — anointing the sick with oil. If to 
observe any rites or ceremonies in the Christian 
church, not appointed or observed in the apostolic 
churches, be unlawful, is it consistent with such a 
position, or is it lawful, to discontinue rites and 
ceremonies which were observed and ordered in 
those churches ? In omitting these apostolic 
rites, those who do so, proclaim that the apostolic 
churches, in mere circumstantials, are only to be 
followed as decency, and the existing state of 
society, will allow. It will be found, by an appeal 
to the practice of those who dissent from the 
Church of England, that a discretionary power 
and authority is exercised, in ordering the mere 
circumstantials of Christian communion and wor- 
ship, and that among them tests of membership 
are enjoined, and practices observed, for which no 
warrant can be alleged from the New Testament. 
What is this but to exercise that power which 
is condemned as anti-christian in the Established 
Church ? 

In what light the Church of England considers 
rites and ceremonies in the worship of God, is 
stated in her thirty-fourth article. " It is not ne- 
cessary that traditions and ceremonies be in all 
places one, or utterly like : for at all times they 
have been diverse, and may be changed according 
to the diversity of countries and men's manners, so 
that nothing be ordained against Goas tvord. 



149 



Every particular, or national church, hath authority 
to ordain, change, and abolish ceremonies or rites 
of the church, ordained only by men's authority, 
so that all things be done to edifying." With this 
agrees what the church teaches on this point in the 
preface to the book of Common Prayer, where the 
reasons are assigned for rejecting some, and re- 
taining others, of those rites which had long pre- 
vailed in the church.* It is clear that the church, 

* But now as concerning those persons, which perad- 
venture will be offended, for that some of the old cere- 
monies are retained still : — if they consider that without 
some ceremonies it is not possible to keep any order, or 
quiet discipline in the church, they shall easily perceive 
just cause to reform their judgments. And if they think 
much, that any of the old do remain, and would rather 
have all devised anew : then such men granting some 
ceremonies convenient to be had, surely where the old 
may be well used, there they cannot reasonably reprove 
the old only for their age, without betraying of their own 
folly. For in such a case they ought rather to have 
reverence unto them for their antiquity, if they will 
declare themselves to be more studious of unity and 
concord, than of innovations and new fangleness, which 
(as much as may be with true setting forth of Christ's 
religion) is always to be eschewed. Furthermore, such 
shall have no just cause with the ceremonies reserved 
to be offended. For as those be taken away which 
were most abused, and did burden men's consciences 
without any cause ; so the other that remain are 
retained for a discipline and order, which (upon just 
causes) may be altered and changed, and are therefore 
not to be esteemed equal with God's law. And more- 
over they be neither dark nor dumb ceremonies, but are 
so set forth that every man may understand what they 
do mean and to what use they do serve. So that it is 
not like that they in time to come should be abused as 
02 



150 



so far from considering as the Church of Rome 
does, rites and ceremonies as substantial and essen- 
tial parts of divine worship, regards them only 
as its accidentals and appendices, as having 
only a human origin, and alterable by that au- 
thority of the church, by which they were ordained. 
These rites, few and expressive, she has retained 
out of a due reverence to antiquity — with a view 
to preserve agreement and order in the public 
worship of God, and as conducing to edification. 
In retaining the few and simple rites which are 
practised in the Church of England, our reformers 
had the sanction of the reformers Calvin, Oecolam- 
padius, and Bucer, names dear to Protestants. 
Calvin declared, " he was for restoring ike face of 
the ancient church — that he would not contend 
about ceremonies, not only those which are for 
decency, but those that are symbolical." Oeco- 
lampadius considered the gesture at the sacrament 
as indifferent. Bucer thought, the sign of the 
cross, after baptism, neither indecent nor unprofi- 
table. Reverence and gratitude to our reformers, 
to whom, under God, we are so vastly indebted 
for our deliverance from Papal bondage, ought to 

others have been. And in these onr doings we condemn 
no other nations, nor prescribe any thing bnt to our 
own people only ; for we think it convenient that every 
country should use such ceremonies as they shall think 
best to the setting forth of God's honour and glory, and 
to the reducing of the people to a most perfect and godly 
livin°:, without error or superstition : and that they 
should put away other things, which from time to time 
they perceive to be most abused, as in man's ordinances 
it often chanceth diversely in divers countries.'' — Of 
Ceremonies — Preface to the Book of Common Prayer. 



151 



make us hesitate in condemning, as anti-christian* 
those few and expressive rites which they thought 
it both wise and useful to retain in the church. 

What is there in the rites ordained by the 
church, either in their nature, number, or ten- 
dency, to prove them anti-christian, or to justify 
separation from the church, on this account ? The 
principal of these are — turning to the east at the 
repetition of the creed — bowing at the name of 
Jesus — the sign of the cross — the use of the sur- 
plice — kneeling at the Lord's Supper ! Turning 
to the east, not bowing, as it is represented, is a 
practice of high antiquity in the church. To turn 
to the east, is a mere indifferent ceremony — ■ 
whereas to bow in that direction, as charged, and 
which is no where enjoined, would imply some 
thing like adoration : the difference is material. 
<e Bowing at the name of Jesus," expressive of 
adoration, has surely in it nothing superstitious, 
and has at least some sanction from Scripture, 
which declares, " that at the name of Jesus every 
knee shall bow." The use of the sign of the cross 
is misrepresented. " The use of the sign," says a 
dissenting writer, " is enjoined both in the liturgy 
and canons of your church ; so that it is made to 
constitute an essential part of the ordinance of 
baptism." The fact is, that the rubric enjoins 
this sign, not as a part of baptism, but after bap- 
tism ; and the canon declares baptism complete 
without it : it is used at the time of receiving the 
baptized " into the congregation of Christ's flock." 
Every church uses some ceremony in the admis- 
sion of its members, for which no scriptural war- 



152 



rant can be adduced ; and shall it then be con- 
sidered wrong in the Church of England, in the 
admission of her members, to use a rite most ex- 
pressive in itself, and consecrated by the practice 
of the church in the earliest ages ? The use of 
the surplice is for decency's sake ; and there is as 
much reason for the use of a white garment, as 
for a black one, Kneeling is considered at the 
sacrament a more becoming posture than that of 
sitting, and is practised in many dissenting con- 
gregations, Those who contend on this subject, 
to be consistent, ought to receive the sacrament in 
a recumbent posture ; for in that position it was 
received by our Lord and his apostles. 

" If," says Bishop Burnet, " churches may lay 
aside apostolical practices, in matters that are 
ritual, it is certainly much easier to justify their 
making new rules for such things ; since it is a 
higher attempt to alter what was settled by the 
apostles themselves, than to set up new rules in 
matters which they left untouched. Habits and 
postures are the necessary circumstances of all 
public meetings ; the times of fasting and prayer, 
the days of thanksgiving and communions, are all 
of the same nature, &c, and chiefly the prescribing 
stated forms for the several acts of religious wor- 
ship, and not leaving that to the capacities or 
humours, to the inventions, and often to the ex- 
travagancies, of those who are to officiate : all these 
things, I say, fall within those general rules given 
by the apostles to the churches in their times ; 
where we find that the apostles had their customs 
as well as the churches of God, (1 Cor. xi. 16.) 



153 



which were then opposed to the innovating and 
contentious humours of some factious men. And 
such a pattern have the apostles set us of comply- 
ing with those things that are regularly settled, 
wheresoever they are, that we find they became all 
things to all men : to the Jews, they "became Jews, 
— though that was a religion then extinguished in 
its obligations by the promulgation of the Gospel, 
and was then falling under great corruption ; yet, 
in order to the gaining some of them, such was 
the spirit of charity and edification with which the 
apostles were actuated, that while they were among 
them, they complied in the practice of those abro- 
gated rites, though they asserted both the liberty 
of the Gentiles and their own in that matter : it 
was only a compliance, and not submission to 
their opinions, that made them observe days, and 
distinguish meats, while among them. If, then, 
such rites, and the rites of such a church, were 
still complied with by inspired men, this is an in- 
fallible pattern to us ; and let us see upon how 
much stronger reasons we, who are under the 
obligations to unity and charity with all Christians, 
ought to maintain the unity of the body, and the 
decency and order that is necessary for peace and 
mutual edification." 

" Therefore, since there is not any one thing 
that Christ has enjoined more solemnly and more 
frequently than love and charity, union and agree- 
ment, among his disciples ; since we are also re- 
quired to assemble ourselves together, to constitute 
ourselves in a body, both for worshipping God 
jointly, and for maintaining of order and love 



154 



among the society of Christians, we ought to ac- 
quiesce in such rules as have been agreed on by 
common consent, and which are recommended to 
us by long use, and that are established by those 
that have lawful authority over us. Nor can we 
assign any bounds to our submission in this case, 
than those that the gospel has limited. We must 
obey God rather than man ; and we must, in the 
first place, render to God the things that are 
God's ; and then, give to Ccesar the things that 
are Ccesar s. So that, if either church or state 
have power to make rules and laws in such matters, 
they must have this extent given them, that, till 
they break in upon the laws of God and the 
Gospel, we must "be bound to obey them. A mean 
cannot be put here : either they must have no 
power at all, or they have a power that must go to 
every thing that is not forbid by any law of God." 

The expediency of such an authoritative ap- 
pointment of those rites, deemed decent and to 
edification, will appear, from its tendency to secure 
agreement and order in public worship. In an 
establishment, embracing, as it must, ministers and 
members of every variety of disposition, how other- 
wise could that love of innovation and change be 
prevented, which has proved so destructive to 
Christian unity ? In this light the matter ap- 
peared to Calvin. In a letter to some who scrupled 
conformity to the rites of the English Church, and 
who sought his opinion on this point, he says, — 
" I do highly approve that there should be a 
certain form of prayer and ecclesiastical rites, 
from which it should not be lawful for the pastors 



155 



themselves to discede : (1) that provision may be 
made for some people's ignorance and unskilful- 
ness ; (2) that the consent of all the churches 
among themselves may the more plainly appear ; 
(3) that order may be taken against the unsettled 
levity of such as delight in innovations." 

But few remarks are necessary as to the further 
power claimed by the church, to have " authority 
in controversies of faith." Agreement in the 
fundamentals of Christian faith, is necessary to 
maintain union in the church. Every Christian 
society admits this, in the choice of its ministers, 
and the admission of its members ; and by so 
doing, exercises that authority, which the Church 
of England claims more formally. The Church 
of England, however, by defining the nature and 
extent of that authority, restricting it within the 
limits of God's word, most effectually guards 
against the abuse of it. In the exercise of this 
authority, she requires her ministers to subscribe 
to certain scriptural creeds and articles. Did she 
not so act and require, it is easy to perceive that 
the same endless diversity of opinion and multi- 
plication of parties would prevail in the Establish- 
ment, as among those who reject such standards of 
orthodoxy. It is to the exercise of this authority, 
so much misunderstood and condemned, under 
God, the Church of England owes her continu- 
ance in u the faith once delivered to the saints :" 
while so many churches, rejecting fixed creeds and 
articles of religion, have departed from the faith, 
and embraced errors the most fundamental and 
dangerous. 



156 



It is likewise objected against the Established 
Church, that by acknowledging the king as the 
head of the church, she attributes to a mere mortal 
man that prerogative which belongs only to Christ. 
It has been said to the churchman, — ee The Church 
of England cannot be the church of Christ, for 
the king, arid not Christ, is the head of your 
church !" The objection now to be considered, is 
founded in a misconception and misrepresentation 
of the former part of the 37th article : — " The 
king's majesty hath the chief power in this realm 
of England, and other his dominions, unto whom 
the chief government of all estates of this realm, 
whether they be ecclesiastical or civil, in all causes 
doth appertain, and is not, nor ought to be, subject 
to any foreign jurisdiction" What this " chief 
power," or supremacy, is, which is here attributed 
to the king, is shown in the following parts of the 
article. " Where we attribute to the kings 
majesty the chief government, by which titles we 
understand the minds of some slanderous folks to 
be offended, we give not to our princes the minis- 
tering either of God's word, or of the sacraments, 
the which thing the injunctions also lately set 
forth by Elizabeth our queen, do most plainly 
testify ; but that only prerogative, which we see to 
have been given always to all godly princes in 
Holy Scriptures by God himself; that is, that they 
should rule all estates and degrees committed to 
their charge by God, whether they be ecclesiastical 
or temporal, and restrain with the civil sword the 
stubborn and evil doers. The bishop of Rome 
hath no jurisdiction in this realm of England." 



157 



The injunction of Queen Elizabeth, referred to 
as above, thus defines the nature and extent of the 
power included in what is usually objected to, as 
the king's headship of the church, " Under God, 
to have the sovereignty and rule over all manner of 
persons born within these her realms, dominions, 
and countries, of what estate, either ecclesiastical 
or temporal, soever they be ; so as no other foreign 
power shall or ought to have any superiority over 
them" 

Elizabeth, on coming to the throne, revived the 
act of the 26th of Henry the Eighth, which de- 
clared, " The king, his heirs, and successors, shall 
be taken and reputed the only supreme head in 
earth of the Church of England." The words 
" in earth," as well as the explanation contained 
in the injunction of Elizabeth, were intended to 
prevent the objection, which, on this point, is 
urged against the Church of England. Bishop 
Jewel informs us, that Queen Elizabeth refused 
the title of head of the church, as one improper to 
be given to any mortal. In consequence of this, 
that title was dropt, and the words " chief power," 
and " chief government," were introduced in the 
stead, as being less liable to be misunderstood, and 
as more clearly expressing what the disused title 
was intended to convey. 

The design of the reformers in framing the 
article in question, and which clearly appears in 
the article itself, will explain its meaning. It was 
to annihilate the jurisdiction which the pope 
claimed to exercise in this kingdom. For centuries 
before and up to the time of the Reformation, the 
p 



158 



popes of Rome claimed and exercised authority in 
all matters ecclesiastical in these realms. Appeals 
were made to them—they granted exemptions from 
the civil authority of the state — bishops were bound 
to them by oaths of fealty inconsistent with that 
obedience which, as subjects, they owed to their 
lawful sovereigns. At length, the popes of Rome 
stretched their authority so far, as to depose 
princes t to dispose of their dominions, and exone- 
rate subjects from obedience to their civil 
governors. It was to annihilate this foreign juris- 
diction, and restore to our princes their lawful 
authority over all estates and persons, both eccle- 
siastical and civil, which had been wrested from 
them, that this article was framed. 

" The plain meaning of the article," says Bishop 
Burnet, in an " Occasional Paper," is this, " that 
no estate or sort of men is exempt from the su- 
preme civil power among us ; that none but the 
magistrate has the right to use the civil sword, or 
to enforce by external compulsion the observance 
of laws ; and that no foreign power, particularly 
that of Rome, has any manner of jurisdiction over 
any of the king's subjects." 

The church alleges the authority of holy Scrip- 
ture for this power, which she attributes to kings : 
" we give not to our princes the ministering either 
of God's word, or of the sacraments — but that only 
prerogative, which we see to have been given 
always to all godly princes by God himself, &c. 
It is a favourite and widely spread opinion, in the 
present day, that religion is altogether an affair 
without the province of rulers, and that any autho- 



159 



ritative interference on their part, is an usurpation 
of that authority which belongs only to God. 
This opinion finds no sanction in the word of 
God. It has already been shown, that those kings 
of the Old Testament most prominent for piety, 
and most approved by God, intermeddled most, 
and authoritatively, in matters of religion. Such 
authority as that exercised in religious matters by 
kings and governors in the Jewish church, was 
never forbidden by God, or questioned by the 
pious Jews. 

A fact recorded at a late period of the history 
of the Jewish church, shows that the Jews, who 
had always been accumstomed to this union of the 
civil and ecclesiastical powers in their princes, con- 
sidered their supreme governor as invested with 
both. (Maccabees i. 14 ) Having chosen Simon 
as their prince, they invested him with supreme 
authority not only to set men over their country, 
works, and weapons, but ordained that it " should 
not be lawful for the people or priests to break any 
of his commandments — to gainsay his words — or 
to call an assembly in the country without him." 

Such an interference of the rulers of a state in 
religious matters was approved and inculcated by 
Dr. Owen, the opponent of episcopacy and the 
champion of independency. Preaching before 
" the Long Parliament," he thus addressed them : 
" Some think," says he, " if you were well settled, 
you ought not, as rulers of the nation, to put 
forth your power for the interest of Christ. The 
good Lord keep your hearts from that apprehen- 
sion !" Again he says, " If it once comes to this, 



160 



that you shall say you have nothing to do with re- 
ligion, as rulers of the nation, God will quickly- 
manifest that He hath nothing to do with you as 
rulers of the nation." 

If, in the opinion of Owen, the learned non- 
conformist, the exercise of power in matters of 
religion was not only lawful but a duty, in those 
who had usurped the royal authority ; shall the 
exercise of such a power in our lawful princes, as 
that set forth in the article in question, be con- 
sidered an anti-christian usurpation ? 

It is somewhat singular, that previous to the 
statute 19 Geo. III., dissenting ministers, on 
applying for licence to preach, did, before the ma- 
gistrates, subscribe on oath to the article in ques- 
tion. " Is it not manifest," observes one, " that 
they did also hereby acknowledge King George 
for their head, unto whom the chief government of 
all estates, whether ecclesiastical or civil, in all 
causes doth appertain ? and is it to be supposed 
that they would have yielded to such a subscrip- 
tion, if they had suspected it to be a virtual de- 
nial of the supremacy of Christ over his church ? 
How groundless, then, is their objection !" 

It is not true, as has been stated, that the sove- 
reign of these realms can alter, or make or un- 
make, the Church of England at his pleasure. 
Xo alteration can be legally made in the church 
without the consent of convocation and the legisla- 
ture, representing the great body of the nation, 
It is therefore not only untrue, but uncandid, to 
represent the king as the head of the church, as 



161 



possessing an authority to rule and model the 
Established Church at his pleasure. 

The following judicious observations of Bishop 
Burnet on the power of princes in religious 
matters, appear to deserve the serious considera- 
tion of those who object to the Church of England 
on this ground. 

" Where a thing is positively commanded or 
forbidden by God, the magistrate has no other au- 
thority but that of executing the laws of God, of 
adding his sanction to them, and of using his ut- 
most industry to procure obedience to them. He 
cannot alter any part of the doctrine, and make it 
to be either truer or falser than it is in itself ; nor 
can he either take away or alter the sacraments, or 
break any of those rules that are given in the New 
Testament about them ; because in all these the 
authority of God is express, and is certainly su- 
perior to his. The only question that can be 
made is concerning indifferent things ; for in- 
stance, in the canons or other rules of the church, 
how far they are in the magistrates' power, and in 
what cases the body of Christians, and of the 
pastors of the church, may maintain their union 
among themselves, and act in opposition to his 
laws. It seems very clear in all matters that are 
indifferent and are determined by no law of God, 
the magistrates' authority must take place, and is 
to be obeyed. The church hath no authority that 
she can maintain in opposition to the magistrate, 
but in the executing the law 7 s of God and the rules 
of the gospel ; in all other things, as she acts 
under his protection, so it is by his permission, 
p 2 



162 



But here a great distinction is to be made between 
two cases that may happen ; the one is when the 
magistrate acts like one that intends to preserve 
religion, but commits errors and acts of injustice 
in his management ; the other is when he acts like 
one that intends to destroy religion, and to divide 
and distract those that profess it. In the former 
case every thing that is not sinful of itself is to be 
done in compliance with his authority ; not to give 
him umbrage, or to provoke him to withdraw his 
protection, and to become, instead of a nursing 
father, a persecutor of the church. But, on the 
other hand, when he declares, or it is visible, that 
it is his design to destroy the faith, less regard is 
to be had to his actions. The people may adhere 
to their pastors, and to every method that may 
fortify them in their religion, even in opposition to 
his invasion. Upon the whole matter, the power 
of the king in ecclesiastical matters among us, is 
expressed in this article, (37th) under those re- 
serves and with that moderation, that no just 
scruple can lie against it ; and it is that which all 
the kings, even of the Roman communion, do 
assume, and in some places with a much more un- 
limited authority. The methods of managing it 
may differ a little ; yet the power is the same, and 
is built upon the same foundation. And though 
the term head is left out by the article, yet even 
that is founded on an expression of Samuel's to 
Saul. (1 Sara. xv. 17.) It is a figure ; and all 
figures may be used either more loosely, or more 
strictly. In the strictest sense, as the head com- 
municates vital influences to the whole body, Christ 



183 



is the only head of his church : he only ought in 
all things to be obeyed, submitted to, and depended 
on ; and from him all the functions and offices of 
the church derive their usefulness and virtue. But 
as head may in a figure stand for the fountain of 
order and government, of protection, and conduct, 
the king or queen may be called the head of the 
church." 

J f it be still said, as it has often been said, that 
such power in religious matters has been unduly 
exercised and abused, we reply, that the abuse of 
this power is no just argument against the right to 
it. It would be no difficult matter to show that 
the exercise of this power, to which, as already 
stated, Owen exhorted " the Long Parliament," 
was in their hands as absolute and marked with as 
great abuse and intolerance, as ever it is pretended 
to have been in the hands of our rightful princes. 
To produce particulars of such an abuse of this 
power in either case, appears to the writer both 
unfair and uncandid, especially at a time when, as 
was not the case then, the just limits of this autho- 
rity are clearly understood and carefully guarded. 
Instead of objecting to that power which the 
church attributes to kings, it rather behoves Chris- 
tians to pray for kings, that they may exercise this 
authority beneficially to the interest of religion ; 
that as prophecy declares, our kings may become 
" nursing fathers," and our queens " nursing mo- 
thers" to the church. 



( 164 > 



CHAPTER V. 

The evils of Separation, an argument for 
Christian union. 

In the preceding chapters, the writer has stated, 
arid he hopes with candour, the result of his in- 
quiries and convictions respecting the religious 
estahlishment of this nation. He has examined the 
various and more popular ohjections urged against 
it, and finds that they are untenable, and do not 
justify separation from its communion. The con- 
clusion to which his inquiries have conducted him, 
is, that the Church of England, being pure in doc- 
trine, scriptural in worship, beneficial in influence, 
and established by that authority, submission to 
which is a Christian duty, is entitled to the con- 
fidence, the attachment, and the conformity of all 
to whom Christian unity is dear, and who attach 
more importance to what is fundamental than to 
what is merely circumstantial in religion. 

In this conclusion, the writer has been strength- 
ened, by a view of the defects and evils which con- 
nect with, and which appear to him to be inherent 
in, the various organized systems of dissent. The 



165 



tendeney and effects of any system or principle, 
furnish a criterion by which a correct estimate may 
be formed of its character and worth. It is true, 
that the best system, the administration of which 
devolves on imperfect man, is liable to abuses and 
corruptions. When it can be satisfactorily shown 
that these are not inherent, but accidental to the 
system, they furnish no just argument against it. 
This appears to be the case as it concerns the 
Church of England. On the other hand, it ap- 
pears to the writer that serious defects— and he 
would use the mildest term — are inherent in the 
system of dissent ; and that the working of the 
system is unfavourable to that unity of the church 
for which the Redeemer prayed, and the promotion 
and maintenance of which is every Christian's 
duty. 

An esteemed writer, whose catholic spirit ought 
to shield him against the imputation of bigotry, 
remarks, — " Dissent, under its best form and most 
allowable circumstances, is to be deprecated as the 
infringement of unity. Christian love may tole- 
rate it, but Christian love cannot approve it." " I 
am most willing to admit that dissent has not been 
unattended with advantages. It has been one 
means of preserving a holy seed among us ; and 
we are greatly indebted to it for the maintenance 
of our civil and religious liberties : but then it 
should be equally admitted — and truth, I think, 
demands the admission —that these are not ad- 
vantages necessarily flowing from dissent, but 
rather expressions of divine mercy and love ; the 
gracious providence of God overruling it for good. 



166 



The evil of disunion is necessary and certain : it 
is felt as a practical evil in most of our parishes 
throughout the land. It separates man from man, 
and Christian from Christian ; it prevents concert ; 
paralyzes charitable effort, hy distracting both our 
designs and performances ; wastes our means, 
whether personal, pecuniary, or religious, and re- 
daces the order and moral agency of our admirable 
parochial system to confusion and inefficiency. 
Could all the decidedly religious in a parish com- 
bine with the minister in religious and charitable 
efforts in resisting abounding iniquity, and encou- 
raging piety and order, both in public and private, 
this ' communion of saints/ would, under God, ex- 
hibit so real and vital an excellence in Christianity, 
that the blessed result could not but be a general 
conviction of its excellence." 

Among the principal defects which appear in- 
herent in the system of government in dissenting 
societies, may be mentioned the following : — The 
degree of irresponsible power exercised by the 
people, for which no scriptural warrant can be pro- 
duced, and which is often destructive of the peace 
and harmony of congregations ; the want of mi- 
nisterial authority in their pastors, who are reduced 
to a state of dependence unbecoming the dignity 
of the ministerial office; its tendency to multiply 
and perpetuate divisions, alike destructive of Chris- 
tian charity and unity. In attempting a justifica- 
tion of these statements, the writer feels that he 
treads on delicate ground : he will, however, at- 
tempt the task with honesty and candour ; con- 
firming as he proceeds his statements, by extracts 



167 



from the writings of those who are the advocates of 
the system he is about to examine. 

1. Dissent, in its various organized forms among 
us, invests the people with that degree of irrespon- 
sible power, for which no warrant can be alleged 
from sacred Scripture, and which is destructive of 
the peace and harmony of congregations. The 
more popular and general form of church govern- 
ment which prevails among dissenters in this 
country, is that which is known under the name of 
independency or Congregationalism, To this 
mode of government may properly be given the 
name of a spiritual democracy. It would not be 
difficult to prove, that of all modes of government, 
that of a republic, or a democracy, is attended 
with most evils. " The evils," says Paley, " are 
dissensions, tumults, factions ; the attempts of 
poweiful citizens to possess themselves of the em- 
pire ; the confusion, rage, and clamour, which are 
the inevitable consequences of assembling multi- 
tudes, and of propounding questions of state to the 
discussion of the people ; the delay, and the expo- 
sure of public counsels and designs ; and the im- 
becility of measures, retarded by the necessity of 
obtaining the consent of numbers." What Paley 
says of a political, is equally applicable to an 
ecclesiastical democracy. Mr. Binney, who de- 
nounces the Church of England as anti-christian, 
and " a great national evil," thus describes the 
system which he would substitute in its stead : 

u In an independent church the people possess 
the power of conducting all the affairs of that 
church : the government of the little community 



168 



is essentially popular and democratic ; the union 
of the members is a union of equals, a brotherhood ; 
friendship is the cement of the society, and either 
in reality or in appearance, is essential to the tran- 
quillity of the state, and the continuance of the 
compact. The society acts ; the power exercised 
at any time is that of the whole, not of any indi- 
vidual, and hence, for the affairs of such a society 
to proceed with success, in perfect consistency with 
the theory, much more wisdom and virtue are 
required in the mass of the people, than when the 
few appoint without any popular appeal, and the 
many obey without any sentiment but that of 
simple submission." To this system itself, which 
requires so much in so many, it is not to be denied 
that such evils as those to which the preceding 
pages refer, are at times to be attributed. In a 
number of persons of various rank, and education, 
and capacity, a great difference of opinion must be 
expected on some subjects of general discussion ; 
and when that happens to he one on which much 
interest and feeling are excited, one on which that 
portion of power, which each possesses, is to be em- 
ployed, — alas ! human nature is too weak not to be 
in danger of betraying itself, under such circum- 
stances, by some symptoms of imbecility, passion, 
or impertinence. 

" The theory is beautiful as a speculation ; and 
it would be equally so in fact, if men were equally 
perfect with the system itself."* 

That there are many dissenting congregations 

* Binney's Memoirs of Rev. J. Morell, page 288, 289. 



169 



who exhibit the peace and harmony which become 
the gospel of Christ, must be ascribed rather to the 
piety, the wisdom, and firmness of those who 
manage their affairs, than to their peculiar system 
of church polity, which has no natural tendency 
to secure this state of things. On the contrary, 
the system which rejects all extraneous authority 
or controul, which invests every member of every 
little community with equal power, which declares 
every congregation independent of all others, and 
which gives the sole power to the majority of the 
people, or members of the congregation, to choose 
its own pastor and other officers, and to order at 
their pleasure all its religious concerns, encourages 
dissensions and factions, of which very many con- 
gregations of dissent exhibit melancholy proof. In 
such a society, so constituted, where, as it regards 
power, all are equal, the occasions which call for 
the exercise of that portion of power which each 
possesses, as in the choice of a minister, the ad- 
mission or expulsion of members, or the adoption 
of measures necessary for the regulation of the 
concerns of the society, are the seasons most 
replete with danger. Then, is demonstrated " a 
want of a principle of adhesiveness, to give con- 
sistency to the body, and a more efficient as well 
as uniform character to its proceedings,"* The 
lust of power, the dictation of wealth, or the conceit 
of ignorance and pride ; the determination of a few 
individuals to carry every thing their own way, 
rend the society in pieces, and cause the separa- 

* Quotation in Eclectic Review, 1831, page 240. 
Q 



"170 



tion from each other of those who should be of 
one heart and of one mind. " It too frequently 
happens/' remarks Mr. Binney, " that the igno- 
rant, the voluble, and the conceited, are the most 
forward ; an opinion once expressed by such, be- 
comes a pledge for invincible pertinacity ; argu- 
ments are heard, not to be weighed, but answered ; it 
is difficult to many men to say, ( I am mistaken/ 
and some rather than say it, will persevere, deter- 
mined to succeed in any point, by any means. It 
sometimes happens too, that those entrusted, as 
the servants of the church, with its temporal 
affairs, and who in general are its organs in all 
matters, are not always the wisest; from certain 
circumstances they may be the most influential, 
and, from the consciousness of office, the most 
obstinately tenacious. The brother does not 
always forget the feelings of the man ; the recol- 
lections of what exists out of the church, will 
often accompany the mind into it ; secular jea- 
lousies and personal pique, will divide and deter- 
mine ' principal people while nameless and num- 
berless circumstances will induce the general body 
to follow the indicated will of some leading Dio- 
trophes."* The amiable and pious young minister 
from whose memoirs the preceding remarks have 
been extracted, in a letter says, " during the time 

of my residence at , I saw and felt so much of 

the evils of a vulgar democracy, that it almost 
made me disaffected to the system. It is much 
easier to find fault with others, than to construct a 



* Binney, page 292, 293. 



171 



good theory for yourself; this I am bound in jus- 
tice to admit, and every honest and impartial dis- 
senter will unite with me in saying, that our system 
is not devoid of practical mischief, however beau- 
tiful it looks in theory." 

The writer expects to be reminded that the evils 
he has noticed are only accidental to the system 
of church government he is examining. His con- 
viction, however, is, and impartial dissenters ac- 
knowledge it, that they are inherent in the system: 
that, while human nature remains what it is, they 
are the natural consequences of the working of the 
system. Such a system, however beautiful in 
theory, is unfitted for human nature as we see it, 
and till human nature is raised to that state of 
moral perfection which such a system supposes 
and requires, it cannot be practically useful. 

The mode of church government noticed, which 
declares each congregation to be independent of 
all others, is at variance with the scriptural repre- 
sentation of the Church of Christ, as one body. 
The apostolic churches, though various, and in 
different places, are represented, and actually con- 
sidered themselves, not as independent of each 
other, but as many members of " one body." 
There was an extrinsic and superior ecclesiastical 
authority, to which they owed and rendered sub- 
mission ; and this was the means of maintaining 
among them that general consent, and order, and 
harmony, for which the Church of Christ, in 
apostolic days, appears so remarkable. In vain 
do we search the New Testament for a single 
instance, of one church claiming to be independent 



172 



of all others ; or maintaining separation from that 
authority or order, which governed the churches ; 
or exercising, what is now considered as a right, 
the power of choosing its own minister and officers. 

The manifest discrepancy of the dissenting 
system of church polity, and its effects, with what 
is recorded of the apostolic churches in the New 
Testament, is to the writer one of the strongest 
proofs, that it is anti-scriptural, both in its cha- 
racter and tendency. 

2. The want of scriptural authority in the 
pastors of dissenting congregations, and the fact of 
their being reduced to a state of dependence in- k 
consistent with the dignity of the ministerial 
office, appear to be evils or defects which adhere 
to the system of dissent. The system has been 
considered defective, as having no tendency to 
secure the union of Christians among themselves : 
it will appear also equally defective in reference to 
that union which ought to subsist between the 
pastor and his flock. Its natural tendency is to 
exalt the power and consequence of the people, 
and to depress the power and respectability of the 
ministry. Such a state of things presents an 
anomaly unknown in the New Testament, and 
may, wherever it exists, be pronounced anti-scrip- 
tural, and destructive of that subordination and 
union which characterize the " body of Christ." 

Under the dissenting system of church govern- 
ment we are examining, the people claim, and 
exercise, what is termed, the right of electing their 
own ministers. It may fairly be demanded of 
those, who contend that every thing in the govern- 



173 



merit of the church for which scripture warrant 
cannot be adduced is unlawful, to point out a 
single passage in the New Testament, in justifica- 
tion of this practice ? A single instance cannot 
be alleged from the New Testament, of a church 
electing its own minister. This was the act of 
those on whom devolved the care of the churches, 
and whose spiritual authority being respected by 
them, was the means of preserving the churches of 
Christ as a united body, a well-organized society, 
walking in gospel order^ and enjoying peace and 
prosperity. 

That a people, or congregation, should elect 
their own minister is reasonable and beautiful in 
theory ; unless, however, it can be admitted, that 
in the exercise of so important a franchise, they 
are guided by sound discretion, and Christian 
principle, it will be found to be unproductive of 
that practical good, so much vaunted. In some 
dissenting societies the election of the pastor is 
confined to that portion of the little community, 
which constitutes the church, or the communicants 
at the Lord's Supper. It may happen, that these 
are a very small portion of the congregation, and 
though supposed to be the most pious, are not 
always the most competent, from their station in 
society, education, or wisdom, to make the most 
judicious choice. Hence have arisen frequent 
jealousies and contentions between the members 
of the church and the subscribers of the congrega- 
tion. In other dissenting congregations, the 
choice of the pastor is with the members of the 
church and the subscribers. In one congregation 
q 2 



174 



which the writer forbears to name, and, it may be 
presumed, there are many similarly constituted, 
according to the trust deeds, " the right of election 
is vested in members of the church, and subscribers 
of not less than ten shillings per annum. The 
minister is removeable at their pleasure — a simple 
majority, in case of election or dismissal, is suf- 
ficient." The choice iherefore of a pastor forms 
an important era in the history of a dissenting 
congregation, and not unfrequently lays the 
foundation of feuds, which endanger the existence 
of the society. The practical results of this part 
of the system will be best stated in the words of 
dissenters themselves. 

Mr. James says, " When a minister is removed, 
the choice of a successor always brings on a crisis 
in the history of the church." — " No event that 
could happen can place the interest of the society 
in greater peril." — " Distraction and division of 
churches have frequently resulted from the election 
of ministers," — <{ We have been accused of wrang- 
ling about a teacher of religion, till we have lost 
our religion in the affray ; and the state of many 
of our congregations proves that the charge is not 
altogether without foundation."* 

Mr. Binney writes, — " The power of choosing 
a minister produces a feeling unfavourable to re- 
ligious result, as it leads all, in some degree, to 
listen rather as judges than disciples ; at certain 
periods this is essential ; but, in the minds of 
many, the feeling frequently continues ; it is too 



* Church Members' Guide. 



congenial to the dominant propensity of human 
nature, to be readily relinquished : hence often a 
variety of evils ; the rude remarks, the vulgar im- 
pertinence, of some of all ranks and both sexes ; 
hence, the general custom of regarding how a thing 
is said, rather than the thing itself, though the most 
momentous, perhaps, within the compass of thought." 

" Such things as the writer has the mortifying 
duty to record are not private matters ; they are 
incessantly taking place, in a large and increasing 
denomination : they become the scandal, and 
occasion the contempt, of dissenting churches in 
the immediate neighbourhood wherever they 
occur."* 

The ministers of the gospel, though forbidden 
to act the part of tyrants over the Lord's heritage, 
are not without spiritual and ministerial authority. 

They are €C the ministers of Christ, and stewards 
of the mysteries of God," (I Cor. iv. 1,) they are 
<f ambassadors for Christ," (2 Cor. v, 18,) they 
are charged to " rule' their people, " to reprove, 
to rebuke, with all authority;" (Titus ii. 15;) 
the people on their part are enjoined " to obey 
them that have the rule over them, and submit 
themselves. (Heb. xiii. 13.) It is fair then to 
infer, that that system of church government which 
does not secure this scriptural authority of the 
minister, and this obedience to his legitimate 
authority, on the part of his people, is not that 
mode of church government which obtained in the 
apostolic churches. Do any of the organized 



* Memoirs of Morell. 



176 



systems of dissent secure the scriptural authority 
of its ministers, or protect them in the due exer- 
cise of it ? In whose hands are the reins of go- 
vernment in most dissenting congregations ? Not 
in the hands of the pastor, hut in the hands of the 
laity. A committee — the deacons — or a few influ- 
ential individuals, rule the whole society, and 
the pastor among the rest. " What," asks Mr. 
James, " what is the deacon of some of our dis- 
senting communities ? The patron of the living 
— the bible of the minister — and the wolf of the 
flock: an individual who, thrusting himself into 
the seat of government, attempts to lord it over 
God's heritage hy dictating alike to the pastor and 
the members." Again, the same author remarks, 
" In many of our churches the pastor is depressed 
far below his level. He has no official distinction 
or authority — his opinion is received with no 
deference, his person is treated with no respect," &c. 

Mr. Binney writes — " With the consciousness 
of a minister as f their servant for Christ's sake,' 
many are disposed to think him such for their 
own, and to occasion disorder by unreasonable de- 
mands on his time, attention, and docility. The 
freedom from priestly domination, laid as the basis 
of the system, will excite, at times, such a feeling 
of independence, as will expand into something 
like popular tyranny. Sensitive to encroachment, 
some will discover, it where none was designed, 
and oppose themselves to the moral authority of 
virtue and wisdom; and others, or the same, from 
the like principle, will seem to think it inconsistent 
with liberty to bow even to truth itself. — Systems 



177 



the most perfect may excite feelings, and prompt 
conduct, much to be deplored in those frail beings, 
who hardly know how to appreciate their perfec- 
tion : hence many of the evils we lament, and many 
inconsistencies almost too palpable to be believed : 
a society of equal brethren, subject to the eapri- 
ciousness and tyranny of one man ; — a fraternity 
of christian brethren divided into petty factions 
by the feuds and jealousies of opposite pillars; — 
an independent expounder of Gods word, subject 
to the insults of captious criticism ; and a holy, 
devoted minister, tortured under the fangs of that 
worst of all possible personifications of heresy 
and antichrist, a haughty, unfeeling, dominant 
deacon !" 

The father of the young minister, whose memoirs 
Mr. Binney has written, says — " It has too often 
indeed been the hard lot of Christian ministers to 
be worried by the officious kindness of teazing, 
tormenting friends. It certainly could not be 
greatly encouraging to my departed son, to be 
told, at the very moment when he made his ap- 
pearance among his people, with a heart beating 
with affection and hope,, that it would be necessary 
to defer his ordination for nine months, or more. 
Nor could it render the labours of the pulpit very 
easy and delightful, to be favoured with a never- 
ending succession of friendly visits, recommending 
him at one time to alter completely his style of 
composition ; at another to avoid certain phrases 
which, though just in themselves, might be deemed 
objectionable ; at another to be less argumentative; 
at another to be more experimental ; at another to 



178 



be more fervent, or more solemn, or more prac- 
tical in his applications/' &c. 

Such a state of things, so completely at variance 
with the requirements of the New Testament, is 
both depressing to the mind and degrading to the 
office of the minister of religion, who feels himself 
brought into a state of bondage to those whom he 
is appointed to rule. To exercise with fidelity his 
ministerial authority in ruling the flock, in reprov- 
ing and rebuking, i( with all authority/' as he is 
enjoined by the word of God, would in many 
instances produce that alienation and disaffection 
among his people, which would occasion strife, and 
end in the separation of the pastor and the flock. 

This unnatural and unscriptural dependence of 
the minister on his people, is increased by his de- 
pendence on their voluntary contributions for the 
support of himself and family. " God hath 
ordained that they which preach the gospel should 
live of the gospel." Where a minister has to look 
to the voluntary contributions of his people, it 
must in most instances bring him into a state of 
subjection to the domination of those, on whose 
feelings towards him the measure of his support 
depends. The power and influence of the sub- 
scriber is felt, by the society and the minister, to 
be according to the amount of his contribution. 
The wealthy subscriber has thus in most instances 
the means in his own hand, of coercing both the 
society and the minister : if the latter be too inde» 
pendent to submit to the dictation which money 
commands, he often feels the effect of it in the loss 
of that pecuniary support necessary to his exist- 



179 



ence, and therefore indispensable to the exercise of 
his spiritual functions. 

We turn from such a state of things to contem- 
plate the reverse of this, exhibited in the records 
of the apostolic churches. There, as the primitive 
Christians claimed not the right of choosing their 
own ministers, they claimed not the right of dis- 
missing them : ministerial authority was respected 
and submitted to as the ordinance of God. Oppo- 
sition to those who had the rule over them, and 
who watched for their souls, and a spirit of faction, 
interrupting the harmony of Christian societies, 
were regarded as sins, which were to be checked 
and put down by the authority and discipline of 
the church. The relation subsisting between the 
pastor and his flock was of too sacred a character 
to be disturbed by the caprice of individuals. If 
the ministers of the gospel, from the peculiar cir- 
cumstances of the Christian interest at that time, 
depended on the voluntary supplies of the faithful 
for their temporal support, it was dealt out to them, 
not grudgingly, but with a liberality which at one 
and the same time expressed the gratitude and 
justice of their people, who, as they had reaped 
spiritual benefits of their ministers, felt that their 
ministers had a right to reap their carnal things. 
We search in vain for any traces of that power on 
the part of the people who composed the first 
Christian churches, which is now unhappily ex- 
ercised to oppress and degrade the Christian 
ministry, and to break up the peace and harmony 
of Christian societies. 

The Church of England appears to the writer 



180 



to be the only portion of the visible church of 
God, in this nation, which exhibits a state of 
things similar to that which has been noticed in 
the apostolic churches. Her ministers possess 
scriptural and ministerial authority — can pursue 
those plans of usefulness which are lawful, un- 
checked by the controul or dictation of any of 
their people — they can make full proof of their 
ministry by reproving and rebuking, as occasion 
may require, with all authority — the provision 
secured for their temporal support, frees them from 
a degrading dependence on their people, as also, 
from those temptations to sycophancy and unfaith- 
fulness, which connect with the opposite system ; 
the union between them and their people is of a 
nature which faction has not the power to disturb, 
and is best adapted to secure the unity of the spirit 
in the bond of peace. 

3. The effect of the system of dissent, is to 
multiply and perpetuate divisions, alike destructive 
of Christian charity and unity. It has been 
remarked, and there is much truth in the remark, 
that, " sectarianism contains in itself the seeds of 
schism in infinite series." The reason which is 
assigned in justification of dissent from the Esta- 
blished Church, will equally require, and justify 
separation, from every other religious community. 
" A common Christian," remarks one writer, " is 
informed that such and such particulars in the 
church of which he is a member, have no scrip- 
tural precept or precedent, and that, therefore, it is 
sinful to comply with it ; he consequently deserts 
his church, and joins with one which he thinks 



181 



more correct, till a similar defect is pointed out 
also in this, which he must again leave in the 
pursuit of another still less exceptionable ; and 
thus he is driven about from church to church, in 
the expectation of finding what nowhere exists ; 
and he at length sits down in despondency, not 
being able to discover upon earth the imaginary 
perfection he had been taught to expect." 

The distinguishing principle urged in justifica- 
tion of dissent, that every individual possesses the 
right of judging and of acting for himself in matters 
of religion, and that no circumstances bind him to 
submit even to things indifferent in religion, the 
authority for which is not to be found in the New 
Testament, if fully carried out, would render the 
existence of a church, as a visible subordinated so- 
ciety, nearly, if not altogether, an impossible thing. 
The effects of such a principle was most manifest 
on the overthrow of the Established Church with 
the monarchy. More heresies and sects started up 
in England within the four years from that event, * 
than had been known in the church of God for 
many centuries before ! The same principle which 
produces separation from the Established Church, 
produces and perpetuates endless divisions and 
separations among dissenters themselves. There 
is no acknowledged authority, human or divine — 
no common principle of unity to cement as one 
body, those who have quitted the Established 
Church. Differing from each other in non-essen- 
tials, the peculiarities which belong to each sect 
keep them wide apart from each other, and not un- 
frequently engender feelings of hostility towards 

R 



182 



each other. Such a state of things is destructive 
of Christian charity and unity ; it divides into 
small and rival "bodies, in places of small popula- 
tion, those who ought to be united under one 
pastor, to enjoy " the communion of saints ;" it 
furnishes matter of triumph to infidelity ; it grieves 
the Spirit of God. It was such a state of things 
which led the devout Baxter to say, tc I once 
thought that all that talk about schisms and sects, 
did but vent their malice against the best Christians 
under these names. But since then I have seen 
what love-killing principles have done. I have 
long stood by while churches have been divided 
and subdivided, one congregation of the division 
labouring to make the other contemptible and 
odious, and this is called preaching the truth and 
the purer worship of God !" 

The writer has felt no pleasure in the review he 
has taken of what have long struck his mind as 
defects and evils in the system of dissent. While 
m making the statements he has, he has not lost sight 
of the divine precept, " Thou shall not bear false 
witness against thy neighbour :" he has given his 
testimony not with hostile feeling, but in spirit of 
Christian affection towards them from whom he 
differs ; and he can unhesitatingly appeal to many 
respectable dissenters for the truth of the repre- 
sentations he has made. 

The remedy of those divisions which have for so 
long a time rent the visible church of Christ into 
so many sects and parties, is in the union of 
Christians, not in a mere spiritual union, such as 
one Christian may feel towards another Christian 



183 



from whom he is separate as to actual communion, 
but a real and visible union. When the Saviour 
prayed that all his people might he one, he intended 
not merely a oneness of spirit, hut a visible union 
and communion which should exhibit them as one 
body, and so demonstrate to the world the divinity 
and excellency of his religion. If every Christian 
endeavoured, as it is his sacred duty, to bring 
about such a union as this, it would, under God, 
be one effectual means of hastening onward the 
glories of those better times to the church, when 
again, the multitudes of believers shall be of one 
heart and of one mind. It would tend greatly to 
this, that Christians should regard, not the ima- 
ginary standards which now separate them, but the 
fundamentals of Christianity as the basis or 
standard of that union after which they are to 
endeavour ; and that they should cherish a deep 
conviction, that those minor points about which 
they differ, do not justify their refusing visible and 
cordial communion with each other. A surrender 
of their own prejudices, a compliance with some 
things in themselves indifferent, for the sake of 
preserving Christian unity, as it can bring no guilt 
upon the conscience, must be a sacrifice well plea- 
sing unto God ; and will go far towards healing 
those schisms in the church which all who love 
the Saviour must deeply deplore. 

It appears to the writer, that of all the religious 
communions which exist among us, at the present 
day, the Church of England has the strongest 
claims to urge as a rallying point, or a centre of 
union, for all who seek the unity of the church of 



184 



Christ. She is the body from which all the rest 
have separated ; she is established by that autho- 
rity, submission to which, in all things not sinful, 
is a Christian duty; the doctrines of the gospel 
are the doctrines propounded in her articles and 
creeds : her formularies of devotion are scriptural, 
evangelical in tone, and breathe a richness of piety, 
and a sublimity of devotion, which are unequalled 
by any other human composition ; her rites and 
ceremonies are ancient, few, and free from super- 
stition ; her ritual was framed by those holy mar- 
tyrs, who, under God, were the chief instruments 
of rescuing us from Popery, who loved her com- 
munion, and who sealed their attachment to her 
with their blood ; she enjoins nothing as a test of 
communion which is sinful ; her spirit is catholic ; 
her ministers are competent to feed the people with 
knowledge and wisdom ; she enjoys evident marks 
of the favour of God in an abundant blessing on 
her ministrations, and in an astonishing revival of 
religion in her community ; she is honoured of 
God as a most efficient instrument in diffusing the 
light and blessings of the gospel among unen- 
lightened nations ; and though last named, it is 
not the least of her claims, she makes the best 
provision for the securing of true religion in our 
own land ; for transmitting the pure word and 
worship of Godto generations yet unborn. As a 
late excellent clergyman observes, " Her ministers 
may die, or men of corrupt minds may arise among 
us, desirous of introducing ' another gospel ;' but 
our principles are fixed : the Articles, Homilies, 
and Liturgy, form an impenetrable barrier against 



185 



error, and while these remain, we cannot be in- 
volved in darkness : we shall possess f the form of 
sound words/ and a spiritual service." What sec- 
tion of the visible church is there which has equal 
claims to prefer on the gratitude, the attachment 
and conformity of those who desire the unity of 
the church ? 

The visible union of Christians, which is now 
pleaded for, is inculcated with a frequency in the 
New Testament, which marks it most strongly as 
a Christian duty, (Phil. ii. 1 — 3 ; Eph. iv. 3, 4 ; 
1 Cor. i. 10; 2 Cor. xiii. 11 ; Rom. xiv. 19; 
Rom. xv. 5.) Among the blessed effects and ad- 
vantages of this union, the following will supply 
so many arguments to enforce it. 

1. It will continue and strengthen the Christian 
cause among us. * The divisions of Christians 
weaken and endanger the Christian cause. God 
has maintained and prospered his cause, in spite 
of the opposition of infidelity, and other anti- 
christian attempts to weaken and crush it ; but he 
has nowhere pledged himself to do this in spite of 
the divisions of professed Christians. When 
Christians organize strifes and separations, and, as 
it is expressed, " bite and devour one another," the 
Spirit of God, who is a spirit of love, of peace, 
and holiness, retires from among them ; religion 
declines ; flourishing churches decay ; and even 
the things which remain, are ready to die. The 
history, both of ancient and modern churches, ex- 
hibits monitory proofs of the truth of these re- 
marks. What ravages has a spirit of division and 
separation made in the church of God ! — it has 

B 2 



186 



engendered a spirit of hostility among the different 
sects of Christians, who resemble more opposing 
armies, under different banners, than members of 
the same family, and subjects of the same Prince ! 
Union is strength. Only let Christians awake to 
a sense of the importance of the long-neglected 
duty of uniting, as one body, and they will no 
longer be weak, but strong and invincible in the 
face of all that combine against the common cause 
of Christianity : the church of God will then, in 
the beautiful words of sacred writ, be " clear as 
the sun, fair as the moon, and terrible as an army 
with banners." 

2. It will demonstrate to an ungodly world the 
divinity and excellency of the Christian religion. 
Pagans, who hated the Christian cause, on behold- 
ing the unanimity and love which prevailed among 
the early Christians, were constrained to admit, 
that the religion which produced such effects must 
be excellent. " See," said they, " how these 
Christians love one another I" — such would not be 
the feeling and conviction of a pagan or infidel ob- 
server of the church of God now. He would see 
those who are the professed subjects of one Lord — 
who are redeemed by one Saviour — who appeal to 
one and the same Bible for their creed — who 
cherish one and the same hope — not only separate 
from, but manifesting bitter and hostile feelings 
towards each other : this state of things supplies 
the infidel, not with evidence of the excellency of 
Christianity, but with reason for its rejection. 
<f Agree," he says, " first among yourselves, before 
you expect others to admit the excellence of, or to 



187 



embrace your religion." The divisions and nume- 
rous sects which prevail among Protestants furnish 
Papists with an argument against Protestantism, 
and in favour of their own corrupt church. Would 
Christians recommend the religion of the Saviour 
to others, there is no more effectual means of doing 
this, than by cultivating a spirit of love, and ce- 
menting a visible union among themselves ; and 
this ought to be an object dearer to them than the 
maintenance of those scruples about the mere cir- 
cumstantials of religion which now alienate them 
in heart, and separate them in communion from 
each other. 

3. This will concentrate the energies, and in- 
crease the resources of Christians for the spread of 
true religion both at home and abroad. Those 
energies and means, which are now expended in 
the maintenance of separation, and of the peculia- 
rities of a sect, devoted to the common cause, 
would accelerate the triumphs of Christianity 
throughout the world. Disunion, it has already 
been observed, " prevents concert, paralyzes cha- 
ritable effort by distracting both our designs and 
performances, wastes our means, whether personal, 
pecuniary, or religious." Many are the instances 
which might be adduced in proof of this. In 
places with a small population the effects of this 
are most painfully felt. The affections of the 
people are alienated from their appointed pastor, 
and where they ought to be united in worship, the 
peculiarities of a sect have kept them asunder; 
thus Christian communion is prevented, and 
jealousies engendered, alike fatal to Christian 



188 



charity and Christian effort for the advancement of 
true religion in the town, the parish, or the neigh- 
bourhood.* The energies employed, and the 
treasures expended in the erection of places of 
worship, and in supporting the peculiarities of dis- 
sent, to a considerable extent, appear to be a waste 
of those means which might be applied success- 
fully to aid the spread of the gospel throughout the 
world. Let but Christians unite as one body, and 
the means which are now wasted will enable them 
to send the blessings of the gospel to the millions 
who are perishing for lack of knowledge. This 
may appear like an appeal to the selfishness and 
avarice of some — it is rather an appeal to Christian 
principle : ought those means to be expended in 
support of the peculiarities of disunion, which 
should be consecrated to the extension of His 
kingdom and glory in the world, who loved us, and 
gave his life a ransom for us ? Ought not the pe- 
cuniary means which have been sacrificed for the 
maintenance of separation among Christians, to 
have been devoted to the accomplishment of the 
Saviours command, to '* go into all the world and 
preach the gospel to every creature ?" Ought not 
that union to be endeavoured by Christians, which 
would thus enable them to concentrate their efforts, 

* The writer feels great pleasure in stating that some 
dissenting ministers, who had opened small places of 
worship in some country villages, on findiug the people 
supplied with an efficient ministry in the church, have 
felt it their duty to withdraw from those places, rather 
than cause divisions which would discourage the settled 
pastor in his labours. 0 ! si sic omnes ! 



189 



and which would increase their resources, to aid 
and extend the triumphs of true religion both at 
home and abroad ? This will be one great means 
of realizing the Saviour's prayer, " That they all 
may be one — that the world may believe that thou 
hast sent me /" 

4, This will remove the principal barrier to the 
more abundant effusion of the Spirit of God, which 
is to precede and introduce the final triumphs of 
Christianity in our world. It is hardly possible to 
imagine anything by which the Spirit of God is 
more dishonoured or grieved, than by the disunion 
and strifes of Christians. The divisions which 
take place in the Christian Church are attributed 
to a want, or absence of the Spirit : " These be 
they who separate themselves, sensual, having not 
the Spirit" For the same reason, St. Paul ad- 
dresses the Corinthians, not as spiritual, but as 
carnal ; " for," says the apostle, " ye are yet 
carnal : for whereas there is among you envying 
and strife, and divisions, are ye not carnal, and 
walk as men ?" (1 Cor. iii. 1 — 3.) It was when 
the disciples of Christ were " of one accord," and 
joined in one Christian fellowship, that the Holy 
Spirit of God descended upon them on the day of 
Pentecost. It was while they continued of one 
heart and of one mind, this divine influence was 
shed on them abundantly, and the word of the 
Lord mightily grew and prevailed. It was when 
strifes and divisions crept into the church, that the 
Spirit of God, aggrieved, retired from the church, 
and to this we must ascribe it, that the Christian 
cause has made such slow advances. This led that 



190 



excellent divine, John Howe, to say, " Our own 
divisions are a very sad argument to us, that the 
Spirit is in a great measure retired and withdrawn : 
that little of the Spirit is working amongst Chris- 
tians in our times, in comparison of what we may 
hope will yet be. If it were amongst us to en- 
liven, it would be amongst us to unite." Re- 
marking on Ezekiel xxxvii. 9, 10, 19, &c, the 
same writer observes, " When there is a recovery 
of the church out of a lapsed, apostatized state, 
out of that death that has been upon it ; then also 
part comes to part : as there the bones come to- 
gether, and flesh, and sinews ; and so every thing 
falls into its own place and order in each particular 
body : and all these bodies into such an order, as 
to make one collective and well-formed body. And 
so it is very plain, too, that when God does design 
to bring that state of things about in his church, 
as he will now have his covenant with them to ob- 
tain everlastingly, so as never more to turn away 
from doing them good ; then he hath promised 
that he will give them one heart and one way." 

It behoves, then, all Christians, not only to 
pray for, but by all sacrifices and means in their 
power, to endeavour to bring about unity in the 
Christian Church : this will be the removal of the 
great barrier to the more abundant effusion of the 
Spirit of God. Let but this happy union prevail 
in the Christian church, and it will be the sure 
earnest of the glories of that better day, in which 
" the whole earth shall be filled with the know- 
ledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea." 



APPENDIX. 



A. — Page 12. 

The lawfulness of a national established religion. 

In proof of the lawfulness and utility of a national reli- 
gious establishment, it may be proper to append some 
additional considerations and testimonies. 

The novelty of the opinion which declares religious 
establishments unlawful and unscriptural, has already 
been noticed. The celebrated Grotius held a far diffe- 
rent opinion, as appears from the following extract from 
his treatise, " Of the Power of the Supreme Magistrate 
in Religion." 

" That authority about sacred things belongs to the 
highest power, we prove, first from the unity of the 
matter about which it is conversant. Paul saith, c He is 
the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon 
him that doeth evil.' (Rom. xiii. 4.) Under the name 
of evil is comprehended also all that which is committed 
in holy things: for the indefinite speech signifies as 

much as the universal The universality of the end 

is correspondent to the universality of the matter. The 
apostle Paul saith, the highest power is God's minister 
for good, of every sort : for explaining himself elsewhere 
more distinctly, he shews the powers are ordained that 
we may lead a quiet and peaceable life, not only in all 
honesty, but, in all godliness also. This, indeed, is the 



192 



true happiness of a commonwealth, as Augustine well 
saith, to love God and be beloved of God : to acknowledge 
Him their King, and themselves his people : who also says, 
The king and rulers are happy, if they make their powers 
serviceable to the Divine Majesty, for the propagation of 
his kingdom and increase of his honour.. .... .And this, 

that is so clearly demonstrated in holy writ, was not alto- 
gether unseen by those that had only the light of na- 
ture : for in Aristotle's judgment, that is the best com- 
monwealth which shews the way to a most virtuous and 
happy life ; and as the same philosopher affirms, that is 
the most happy way of life which leads most directly to 
the knowledge and service of God, the contrary whereof is 
most unhappy. Now if this be true, that the end pro- 
posed to the highest powers is not only external peace, 
but that their people may be most religious ; and the 
things conducing to that end are called sacred ; it follows 
that these things are all included within the command and 

authority of the same power To these arguments, 

drawn from the very nature of the thing, shall be added 
the most sacred and certain authority of the divine law. 
Bangs are commanded to keep all the law of God, (Deut. 
xvii. 19 ;) to serve the Lord, (Jos. i. 8 ;) to kiss the Son, 
(Ps. ii. 12.) This being spoken to kings, not as men, 
(for so it would not concern them more than other men,) 
but as kings, it follows, some royal act is required of 
them, that is, the use of their authority, in matters of 
religion. I had rather explain this in Augustine's words 
than my own : — Herein do kings, as they are commanded 
by Him, serve God as kings ; if in their dominions they 
command things good, and forbid evil, not only in re- 
spect OF HUMAN SOCIETY, BUT THE WORSHIP OF GoD 

also. And in another place : — The king serveth God as 
a man, as a king : as a man, by a godly life ; as a king, by 
godly laws. As Ezechias, by destroying the groves and 
temples of the idols : and as Josias served God in the like 
manner, doing those things for the honour of God, which 
kings only can do. And this is that royal nursing of the 
church which by the prophet God hath promised. (Isa. 
xlix. 23; lx. 13, 16.) After the divine law, follows in its 



193 



order the custom of the church, and the example of em- 
perors whose piety is out of question That the 

churches reformed in our fathers' time, after the ancient 
pattern, are of the same judgment, their confessions 
witness. It belongs to magistrates, not only to be careful 
of civil polity, but to endeavour that the sacred ministry be 
preserved, and the kingdom of Christ propagated : that the 
gospel be purely preached, and God served according to his 
holy word. So the Belgic : — Let the magistrate hold fast 
the word of God, and see that nothing be taught contrary to 
it. So the Helvetian: — This office was enjoined the 
heathen magistrate, to take care that the name of God be 
duly honoured : how much more belongs it to the Christian 
magistrate, as the true deputy of God in his dominion. So 
the Basil confession: — Besides the divines, all the writers 
of polity, that are worth reading, have given account of 
this, not only as a part hut as the principal and best 
part, of the imperial right. Neither have only the 
ancient Christians and late reformed, but other 
nations also, delivered this with so great con- 
sent, that it is most manifestly the very voice of 

RIGHT REASON, COMMON TO ALL MANKIND: and being 

derived from the most ancient, before the depravation of 
religion, by a long succession hath been delivered to 
their posterity." — Grotius De Imper. Summ. Pot. Circa 
Sacra, c. i. 

The pious and excellent commentator, Matthew Henry 
a Nonconformist, says, 

" Let us much more give God praise for the national 
establishment of our religion — that the Christian religion, 
that choice and noble vine which was so early planted 
in our land, is still growing and nourishing in it — that 
it is refined from the errors and corruptions the Church of 
Rome had, with the help of ignorance and tyranny, in- 
troduced ; and that the Reformation was in our land a 
national act : that Christianity, thus purified, is 

SUPPORTED BY GOOD AND WHOLESOME LAWS, AND IS 
TWISTED IN WITH THE VERY CONSTITUTION OF OUR GO- 
VERNMENT." — Separation without Rebellion. 

" To go back from the courts of onr Establishment to 
s 



194 



its parishes, where, after all, he (the minister of the gos- 
pel) is on his own vantage-ground for the service of 
Christian patriotism,— he can there expatiate without 
restraint, in all the deeds and the devices of highest use- 
fulness. It is in this precious home-walk of piety and 
peace, that he can acquit himself of his noblest minis- 
trations for the interests of our immortal nature, and the 
good of human society. It is there where he pours the 
purest influence around him, whether by the holiness of 
his pulpit, or the kindness of his household ministra- 
tions. I cannot imagine a stronger, yet happier ascen- 
dant, than that which belongs to a parish minister, who, 
throned in the cordialities of his people, finds unbounded 
welcome at every cottage-door, and, by his unwearied 
attention at sicknesses, and deaths, and funerals, has im- 
plicated the very sound of his name and idea of his 
person, with the dearest interests of families. We posi- 
tively know not any where else than under this mild 
patriarchal oversight, that a scene of such moral loveli- 
ness can be found, or one where the hopes of heaven, 
and the best and kindest affections of earth, are so beau- 
tifully blended. To uphold the system which covers the 
land with so blessed and benignant an economy as this, 
may well be termed the chief defence of the nation ; to 
uproot is the gothic imagination of certain unfeeling cal- 
culators, whose sole principle in their dealings with 
society is to follow the leadings of a heartless arithmetic, 
but who, in the very outset of their plodding computa- 
tions, overlook what that is which constitutes the chief 
element of a nation's properity, and a nation's great- 
ness." — Dr. Chalmers on Establishments; Pulpit, No. 
561. 

With singular inconsistency, they who exclaim against 
an establishment of religion by those in authority, as 
unlawful, anti-scriptural, and anti- evangelical, have 
within a very few years, acted on the very principle they 
condemn ! " When the excellent men who were sent 
out by the London Missionary Society to the South Sea 
Islands had, by the conversion^ many of the chiefs and 
natives of those islands, been the means of introducing 



195 



Christianity into them, so far from cautioning these 
chiefs that the affairs of religion were not within their 
province as civil magistrates, they earnestly persuaded 
them to the exercise of their official influence and autho- 
rity/or the public establishment of Christianity and the 
endowment of its teachers /"* 



B.— Page 17. 

The corruption of Christiaity as the effect of religious 
establishments. 

(< To establish religion," it is said, " is first to corrupt it, 
and then to destroy it." Dr. WardJaw, in a sermon on 
Civil Establishments of Christianity, says, " The system 
of national Christianity necessarily involves corruption, 
and precludes the possibility of purification " The follow- 
ing observations of Dr. Chalmers will supply a sufficient 
refutation of the charge. 

" There is a kind of vague and general imagination, 
as if corruption were the invariable accompaniment of 
such an alliance between the civil and the ecclesiastical. 
And this has been greatly fostered by the tremendously 
corrupt popery which followed in historical succession 
after the establishment of Christianity in the days of 
Constantine, and which certainly shows in vivid contrast 
the difference between this religion in the period of its 
sufferings, and this religion in the period of its security 
and triumph. But it were well to discriminate, (and it 
requires attention to do so — more attention, we fear, 
than is sufficient to bear down the popular and the pre- 

* Answer to the Case of Dissenters, p. ]01 : where may he seen 
extracts from the journals of these missionaries in proof of the above 
statements. 



196 



vailing theory which is lifted against establishments,)— 
I say, it were well to discriminate the precise origin of 
this frightful degeneracy. It arose not from without — 
it arose from within. It was not because of any ascen- 
dancy of the state over the church, whom it now paid, 
and thereby trenched on its independence in things spi- 
ritual : it was because of an ascendancy of the church 
over the state, the effect of that superstitious terror 
which it wielded over the imaginations of men, and 
which it most unworthily prostituted to the usurpation 
of power in things temporal. The fear that many have 
of an establishment is, lest the state should obtain too 
great power over the church, and so be able to graft its 
own secularity, or its own spirit of worldliness, on the 
pure system of the gospel : whereas the actual mischief 
of popery lay in the church having obtained too much 
power over the state, and in the false doctrine which it 
devised to strengthen and perpetuate a temporal domi- 
nion which should never have been permitted to it. 
There is no analogy between the apprehended evil to 
Christianity from an establishment now-a-days, and the 
actual evil inflicted on Christianity by the corrupt and 
ambitious hierarchy of Rome. The theoretical Jear is, 
lest the state should meddle with the prerogatives of the 
church : the historical fact is, that the church meddled 
with the prerogatives of the state. So far from the ap- 
prehended corruption having experience to rest upon, it 
is the reverse in the actual fact." 

" It is not true that corruption must adhere, in virtue 
of its very nature, and as of necessity, to an establish- 
ment. There will be corruption, in fact; but rightly 
to estimate the quarter it comes from, distinction should 
be made between the nature of the institution, and the 
nature of man. In virtue of the former, there may be 
no contamination, while in virtue of the latter there may 
be a great deal. An establishment may, in this case, be 
the occasional, but not the efficient cause, of mischief. 
The machine may be faultless ; but, exposed as it must 
be, when the mechanist is lost, to the innovation of 
hands which, in a certain degree, will despoil and vitiate 



197 



all they come in contact with, — the remedy is not to 
demolish the machine, but to transfer the hands that 
wrought it to other management and modes of opera- 
tion : there will still be corruption, notwithstanding. It 
will prove a vain attempt, if you think to make a good 
by transferring human nature from the economy of an 
establishment to the economy of any of our sectaries. 
The human nature which you thus transfer, will carry 
its own virus along with it ; and while that nature re- 
mains, there will be corruption, which is strictly charge- 
able on neither one economy nor on the other. It fol- 
lows not, therefore, from this one, or that other abuse, 
that the framework of the establishment should be des- 
troyed. To make head against an abuse, we should 
direct our efforts to the place where the abuse originated 
not to the machinery, therefore, in the present instance, 
but to the men who work the machinery. It is not to 
a constitutional or political change in any of our esta- 
blishments, that we should look for the coming regene- 
ration of our land ; it is to a moral and spiritual change 
in those who administer them. It is there, and not in 
the framework, where the change and the correction 
must be made. This is the way to get rid of corruption, 
and not by putting forth upon our national institutions 
the innovating hand of a destroyer. There are corrup- 
tions in the civil government of the empire ; yet that is 

no reason why it should be brought to dissolution 

Were the establishment, and that, too, under the pretext 
of its corruption, destroyed, — this would do nothing, 
and worse than nothing. Were the establishment, either 
in the whole, or in certain parts of its constitution, re- 
formed, this of itself would do little, and so little, as to 
stamp insignificance on many a contest of ecclesiastical 
policy. Were the establishment to have the Spirit of 
God poured forth on its clergy in their work, and the 
multiplication of its churches and parishes made more 
commensurate with the wants of our increasing popu- 
lation, this, and this alone, would do every thing." — On 
Establishments; Pulpit, No. 561. 

s 2 



198 



C— Page 61. 
On Compulsory Payments to the Established Church, 

Of late, in particular, every effort has been made to 
create a prejudice against the church, by an outcry 
against the injustice of compelling dissenters to support 
the church establishment by the payment of church 
rates and tithes. On these points much spontaneous 
ignorance has been displayed, and much unfair and 
anti- christian misrepresentation, has been employed. 
The following extracts from two recent popular tracts 
against the church, will furnish evidence of the truth of 
this statement. 

Mr. James, in his pastoral address, says, "Religious 
establishment are unjust, at least, in all those cases where 
the whole nation is compelled to support them, and 
where there should happen to be any who dissent from 
them. To force dissenters to pay for a form of religion 
which they do not approve, and never attend, is as ma- 
nifest a piece of injustice as it would be to compel us by 
law to support a physician appointed by the state, but 
whom we never consult, and in whose skill or prescrip- 
tions we have little confidence." 

In a letter addressed to the lord chancellor on the case 
of dissenters, which is attributed to the pen of the Rev. 
A. Reed, a London dissenting minister, which has been 
widely circulated over the kingdom, and a copy of which, 
with the view of making an impression, is reported to 
have been sent to every member of the legislature,— it is 
said : — " For the state to compel the dissenters to con- 
tribute, either by tithe or church rate, to uphold the 
established church, while he is left to bear the burdens 
of his own church alone, is an outrage on righteous 
government and manly feeling. It is taking away his 
property without an equivalent, which is robbery. It is 
applying it to uphold a system which his conscience 
condemns, which is sacrilege !" 

They who will decide aright on these points, and on 



199 



the soundness and justice of the above exciting state- 
ments, will find it necessary to discriminate between 
church rates and tithes. The former go to meet the inci- 
dental expences connected with the repairs of the church 
edifice, burial yards, and the decent performance of 
public worship; while the latter constitute the legal 
emoluments of the clergy. 

The justice of exacting from all classes who are liable 
to such a tax, the payment of church rates, rests upon 
the same principles as a church establishment. If the 
legislature deem a national religious establishment ne- 
cessary and beneficial to the nation, then have they a 
clear right to exact from the community at large the 
means necessary for its support. The authority of laws, 
especially of laws enacted by a representative govern- 
ment like our own, cannot with safety be allowed to be 
nullified by the prejudice, the selfishness, or the affected 
conscientiousness of individual objectors. On this point 
however, I am happy in being able to reply in the words 
of a writer in the Eclectic Review, a journal which is 
entitled to be regarded as the organ of the sentiments of 
the more judicious portion of the dissenting body. 

" It appears to the writer, that so long as the support 
of the establishment by legal provisions shall be deemed 
necessary or proper by the constitutional authorities, 
they have an undoubted right to tax the community of 
every description for that purpose ; and that a difference 
of opinion entertained by individuals, as to the fitness 
of the object, is no more a ground for exemption from 
contribution, than a difference of opinion on any other 
question of political economy, is a ground of exemption 
from payment of the taxes applicable to the measure 
disapproved. The state enjoins me to pay — by force of 
the social compact the state has a right to my obedience ; 
and my paying is the evide nee not of my submission of 
opinion, but of my civil obedience to the estate. Under 
every possible form of government, individual will must, 
for all practical purpo se s, be sacrificed to the public will, 
as proclaimed by the constituted organs. If the state 
applies, or orders me i o apply, the money paid to an ob- 



200 



ject which I do not apprehend to be aid- worthy, that is 
no ground for my refusal to obey, or there is an end of 
civil obedience at once, and the private opinion of every 
individual becomes the measure of his civil submission." 

To the above observations from a dissenting periodi- 
cal, I will add the remarks of a clergyman of the 
established church : " If the established church is so 
odious in the sight of God that it is a sin to support it, 
then they who pretend to say that their consciences will 
not allow them to give their contributions to its support, 
may be justified in the sight of God in withholding 
them ; but this can form no ground of action for a legis- 
lature that holds directly the contrary, and also main- 
tains that the established church is a national benefit. 
The conscience of the individual must not be allowed to 
stand in the way of the general good. Be it remembered, 
also, that he who under such circumstances cannot plead 
that the object for which his contribution is demanded is 
positively sinful, and still stirs up the discontent and 
clamours of the people on the subject, commits a direct 
and flagrant breach of the law of God. (Rom. xiii. 
1 — 7.) And hence, no doubt, the sense which the more 
keen- sighted and consistent of our opponents have, of 
the necessity to endeavour to fix upon it such a charge, 
and aver that the established church is an obstacle to 
the progress of truth and godliness in the land, that it 
destroys more souls than it saves," &c. (Binney s 
Address.) Such a statement I leave, convinced that it 
can only injure its author. But, arguing the matter 
even on such ground, I reply, that we have no evidence 
of the primitive Christians objecting to the Roman 
taxes on the ground that part of them was appropriated 
to the support of idolatry. But had it been a sin in the 
sight of God to pay taxes so appropriated — which alone, 
be it observed, can make it a violation of the dictates of 
a righ t judging conscience, we should not have wanted 
abundant testimony' to their adoption of such a course. 
A tender conscience is a great blessing when a man is 
rightly instructed; but if he sets out with false notions, 
it is more likely to lead him into error than be a useful 



201 



guide*, for it is susceptible of false as well as true im- 
pressions ; and has so many feelings to contend with 
when it is brought in to guide the purse-strings, that 
the corruption of human nature will, in every case 
readily furnish it with a reason for refusing to draw it. 
If all the vagaries of men's consciences are to be con- 
sulted and taken as a guide by the legislature in matters 
that concern the general good of the community, all 
legislation is at an end; and if the public burdens are to 
be adjusted according to what each man declares to be 
the dictates of his conscience, it will be difficult to find 
those whose consciences will sit easy under more than a 
very light load. It is much to be regretted that there is 
not the same tenderness of conscience in other matters ; 
and that a contribution to the church is so much more 
keenly felt than an infraction of the ninth command- 
ment. 

" Suppose an epidemic to be raging throughout the 
land, carrying off multitudes everyday; and that men 
were naturally inclined to value their health as little as they 
do religion? so that, while they all agreed that medicine 
was necessary, they cared not, most of them, to take any 
trouble to procure it, and more than all, loved best 
naturally those whose medicines gave them temporary 
pleasure^ but in the end produced death ; and that the 
state appointed certain medical officers to administer 
remedies, each in his own district; and that, amid 
various opinions of the best mode of cure, it selected 
those who adhered to the oldest and most generally 
approved method, and called upon the inhabitants of 
the country, as they valued the health of the population 
generally, and particularly of those who could not afford, 
to pay for medical attendance, to pay a tax for their 
support. What would be said of the man who should 
reply — What is civil only belongs to civil government, 
and therefore the state has no right to tax me for this 
object : moreover, I derive no benefit from these national 
attendants^ for I have my own, and have to pay him, 
and therefore am not to be called upon to pay another 
besides : nay, further, I object to the method followed 



202 



by those whom the state patronizes, and therefore cannot 
conscientiously give them my, support. 

" What ! is the government to look calmly on, while 
it sees its subjects perishing all around, and say, I am 
very sorry, but I have nothing to do with it, it is out of 
my province ? And is it true that the objector reaps no 
benefit from the measures that save him from experi- 
encing all the consequences of a diseased community, 
and a depopulated country ? And while he allows that 
the method patronized by the state is, though not the 
best in his eye, able to save life, and actually efficient to 
that end to a great extent, will he deceive one person as 
to the predominant feeling that shuts his purse, while 
he is talking about his conscience ? 

Now, if men are afflicted with a moral disease, which 
they care not to attend to, and even encourage, aud 
which is daily cutting off numbers from the body of 
useful and respectable members of the community ; are 
there to be no moral means secured by the state (taking 
the matter even on this low ground) to meet this great, 
this growing evil ? Does the dissenter reap no benefit 
from the means taken to check it, that he, who is talk- 
ing the loudest about his desire to support religion, 
should grudge the mite he is called upon to bestow upon 
the established church ? 

" To show the complete rottenness of the plea of con- 
science, I shall mention only this one fact, that the 
Missionary Society, of the denomination whose princi- 
ples are advocated by this author, (Rev. A. Reed,) and 
which alone almost ojmoses a church establishment, 
comes annually to the church which the supporters of 
that society denounce as so corrupt that they cannot 
conscientiously give a farthing towards its support, for 
the solemnization of a form of worship to which they 
profess conscientiously to object, in order to obtain pecu- 
niary aid." — Answer to the case of the Dissenters. 

In addition to what has been remarked in the above 
extract, it may be said, without the fear of contradiction, 
that in far the greater number of instances, dissenters 
do receive a full equivalent for the amount of church 



203 



rates contributed by them, not merely in the general 
good effected by the established church, but in the par- 
ticular and local benefits which they receive from the 
clergy of the establishment. In our rural districts and 
numerous villages and hamlets, too poor and scattered 
to admit of resident dissenting ministers, how awful 
would he the disorganization of society and the corrup- 
tion of morals, but for the influence of the resident 
clergy ! The clergyman in very numerous instances is 
the only individual to render those pastoral and benevo - 
lent attentions to dissenters in our rural districts, which 
are so necessary and important in the season of affliction 
and want ? Shall it be said, then, after this, by dis- 
senters, that they receive no equivalent for the small 
contribution which the state enjoins them to make to 
the Established Church ? 

Nothing can have even the semblance of a justification 
of that passive resistance to church rates which by some 
has been recommended, but the plea that the object to 
which the contribution is demanded is positively sinful. 
This, contrary to matter of fact, is now urged by some 
dissenters. It is said, a national religious establishment 
is in itself an ti- christian, and that the Church of Eng- 
land is so totally corrupt, and " a national evil," that to 
support it is a sin. In the fifty-first number of the 
Library of Ecclesiastical Knowledge, now before me, 
something like this ground is assumed, and several 
reasons are assigned why God " is not likely to give his 
especial blessings to the Church of England /" Referring 
to the constitution of the church establishment, it is said 
in that publication, " Other sects may have their errors 
and evils ; but such is the atrocious character of this high- 
treasonable offence against the Majesty of heaven, that we 
wonder his fury has not been more visibly displayed against 
it !" Let the confessions of dissenting ministers them- 
selves furnish the contradiction to charges so false, and 
to insinuations so anti- christian. The late Robert 
Hall, as quoted by Archdeacon Hodson, said long ago, 
" In justice to the established clergy of the realm, I 
cannot but remark the great advance which they have 



204 



exhibited during the last half century. They have gone 
forth in numbers, rekindling the lamp of heavenly 
truth, where before it had burned with a dim and sickly 
ray. They have explored and cultivated many a neg- 
lected spot, into which other labourers could not, for 
obvious reasons, gain admission with equal facilities of 
influence. And far be it from any of their dissenting 
brethren to regard their success with any other than a holy 
jealousy, a godly emulation." Mr. James, though a most 
determined opponent of the Established Church, as 
before quoted, is constrained to admit, " Our own," the 
Church of England, " for instance, has done immense 
service to the cause of religion, both by its vast theo- 
logical literature, and by its evangelical ministers, and 
never was it more useful in the latter respect than it is at 
this moment." Would, then, that instead of bringing 
railing accusations against, and seeking the overthrow 
of a church which God is abundantly blessing, and 
making extensively a blessing, dissenters would attend 
to the wise and Christian admonitions dealt out to them 
by the excellent Dr. Pye Smith, in a sermon addressed 
to "the Monthly Association of Congregational Churches 
and Pastors." 

ie I will," says the doctor, " only beseech you, my dear 
hearers, and especially the ministers of the gospel of 
peace, to remember your holy character as children of 
peace; to pray that 'the Lord of peace may give us 
peace always and by ail means ; and on no account to 
lose your interest in his gracious declaration, c Blessed 
are the peace-makers, for they shall be called the chil- 
dren of God.' We cannot help being involved in the 
agitations of our time — a time probably big with events 
of solemn importance for all the interests of our country, 
especially its religious interests. But, my honoured 
brethren, let us take heed to our own spirits, and strive 
and pray, that 6 we do no evil,' that we discountenance 
to the utmost hard speeches, rash assertions, exaggerated 
statements, sarcastic or in any way irritating expres- 
as, and in every thing, in word or deed, that is incon- 
cent with the meekness and gentleness of Christ. Let 



205 



our feelings, speakings, doings, be 'the truth in 
love.' Contending for a good cause, in a spirit which 
our holy and faithful Master will not approve, is the 
most certain of all ways to procure disappointment. 
Our Lord would act in mercy, by denying the attain- 
ment of what we consider right objects of pursuit, if he 
saw that we pursued them sinfully," &c. 

The abolition of compulsory payment of church rates, 
from all who are now liable to them, would be the con- 
cession of a principle which it is important and righte- 
ous to maintain, so long as a national establishment of 
religion is deemed by the state necessary and beneficial. 
It would be a bonus to landlords, but no relief ultimately 
to the mere occupiers of property so assessed. The par- 
tial abolition of this payment in favour of dissenters, 
would be to offer a bounty to defection from the estab- 
lished church, and would therefore be an injustice and 
injury to the church. If, as the premier is reported to 
have hinted to a dissenting deputation, this concession, 
if made at all, could only extend to the actual members 
and communicants of dissenting societies, would not 
the dissenter have reason to fear that many would press 
to the Lord's table for the sake of saving money, and 
thus a more fearful desecration of the Lord's supper 
would ensue, than was objected, as the consequence of 
the repealed Test and Corporation Act. 

Tithes constitute the other branch of compulsory pay- 
ments to the established church. It is unnecessary to 
repeat here many things already advanced, and which 
equally apply here. On the subject of tithes some mis- 
taken views are current which require to be corrected. 
Tithes are represented as national property, as a property 
originally given to the church by the state, and therefore 
it is said, the state has an equitable right to recall them, 
and to apportion and apply them, at its pleasure. Both 
the premises assumed, and the inferences drawn from 
them, are denied. No fact admits of clearer or stronger 
proof than this one, that the tithes, which are the en- 
dowments of the church, were not the donations of the 
state, but the free donations of individual lords of the 
T 



206 



soil, who appropriated them to religious purposes. The 
lord of a manor, or the owner of an estate, desirous of 
securing religious instruction to his domestics, as well 
as to those who cultivated his land, hy the residence of 
a minister of religion among them, at his own cost 
built a church, in which the inhabitants of the district 
might assemble for public worship, and a house, with 
an attached glebe, for the residence of the minister. 
" Having thus created a parochial benefice, he volun- 
tarily, freely, and expressly endowed it with a certain 
portion of the gross produce of his estate, as an inde- 
pendent and inalienable provision for each succeeding 
incumbent, constantly resident upon his cure, and de- 
voting his attention to the religious and moral improve- 
ment of the parishioners." " This furnishes a satis- 
factory reason for the singular forms and uneqal extent 
of English parishes. Whenever a benefice was insti- 
tuted by the owner of the soil, the limits of his private 
estate became the boundary of the newly- created parish. 
Hence our manorial and parochial boundaries are 
generally found to be coincident ; and all exceptions to 
this rule are capable of being accounted for, by a refer- 
ence to the revolutions which have taken place in the 
state of landed property, at various periods subsequently 
to the endowments of parish churches."* To the bene- 
fice thus instituted, the patron reserved to himself, and 
his heirs and assigns, the right of presenting the incum- 
bent on every subsequent avoidance. Such appears to 
have been the origin of parochial endowments, and of 
church patronage. This is confirmed by the opinion of 
judge Blackstone: " The lords," he says, ** as Christianity 
spread itself, began to build churches upon their own 
demesnes or wastes, to accommodate their tenants upon 
tme or two adjoining lordships; and, in order to have 
divine service regularly performed therein, obliged all 
their tenants to appropriate their tithes to the mainte- 
nance of the one officiating minister, instead of leaving 
them at liberty to distribute them among the clergy of 

* See an excellent pamphlet, " The Revenues of the Church of Eng- 
land not a burden," &c. (Murray, publisher.) 



207 



the diocese in general ; and this tract of land, the tithes 
whereof were so appropriated, formed a distinct parish." 
— Comment, vol. i. p. 1 13. 

It may well be asked, such being the case, where is 
the injustice, in the legislature compelling the payment 
of the tithes, the endowments of the church, from those 
liable to such payments ? A writer before quoted, 
justly observes, " In whatever manner we suppose the 
church to have become originally entitled to a tenth of 
the produce of the soil, it can make no difference with 
respect to the pressure of this charge at the present 
time ; for it is indisputable, that the whole real property 
of the country has frequently changed hands since the 
payment of tithes was finally recognized by the laws as 
a burden upon land. If it be assumed, that the tenth 
part of the produce of the soil became, in the first 
instance, appropriated to ecclesiastical purposes, not by 
an immediate and express grant from the owner of the 
freehold, but by the gradual operation of custom, which 
is the origin and substance of our common law, the 
effect is still the same. The owner of the land at the 
period when this custom was first introduced, did, no 
doubt, find the value of his property affected by its opera- 
tion — by the pressure of such a novel charge upon his 
land ; but those who have succeeded him in his pos- 
sessions, either by inheritance or by purchase, cannot 
properly be said to bear any part of this burden. The 
onus of tithes having been once 'permanently fixed, all the 
landed property of the country has descended to, or been 
purchased by, its present owners subject to this charge : and 
on every transfer of this species of property, its selling 
price was reduced in proportion to the permanent charge 
to which it is subject." The justice and truth of these 
remarks, are confirmed by a dissenting writer in the 
Eclectic Review, before quoted ; referring to compulsory 
payments to the established church, he says — 

" All this has nothing to do with the question of the 
right of the state to dictate in matters of religion, (which 
the writer is the last person in the world who would 
attempt to advocate,) because the payment of tithes is 



208 



not required by the state, as evidence of assent to the doc- 
trines or discipline of the Church, nor is any such mean- 
ing attached to it. I am in no other dilemma with re- 
gard to tithe, than I am with regard to levies of any 
other description, the purposes of which I may think 
morally or politically unjustifiable. The state, provided 
I pay my taxes, leaves me in the undoubted possession 
of any private opinion I may think fit to entertain. It 
never attempts to tell me that I have pledged my indi- 
vidual assent to the cause, by contributing my quota 
towards its requisitions. The writer is happy to find 
his view of the subject is countenanced by a man of 
considerable erudition, whose name is, he understands, 
still held by Protestant dissenters in much veneration. 
£ Tithes,' says he, ■ when first established among Chris- 
tian states, were thought a very great hardship, as is 
evident from the manner in which they were first intro- 
duced, from the severe laws which anciently enjoined 
their payment, and frorn the pious frauds made use of, 
both here and on the continent, in order to prevail with 
the people to consider them as a Christian duty, as well 
as an injunction of the state. But they cannot well be 
looked on now as an oppression; length of time has 
taken away the causes of reasonable complaint, some 
circumstances excepted, which affect the landholders 
only, and which are not at all of a religious nature . 
There is not a family in the kingdom which has any legal 
and just right to more than nine parts of those estates 
which pay tithes. No more than nine parts are ever pur- 
chased j and no dissenter, I suppose, will attempt to prove 
that the lands which he now possesses have been in /us 
family ever since the days of Alfred, or his son Edward. 

To REFUSE TITHES, WOULD BE TO USURP A PROPERTY 
WHICH IS NOT OUR OWN, AND TO WHICH WE CAN HAVE 
NO JUST CLAIM, AND WOULD BE EQUALLY INCONSISTENT 
WITH OUR COMMON NOTIONS OF RIGHT AND WRONG, AND 
WITH THE ACKNOWLEDGED PRINCIPLES OF EVERY CIVIL 

government.'" — The Rev. John Fell's fourth Letter on 
Genuine Protestantism. 
It is easy, by an appeal to the cupidity and selfishness 



209 



of many who pay tithes, to excite them to shake off this 
payment ; but it may be asked, is not this to practice on 
them a gross delusion ? Assume, for the sake of an ar- 
gument, that the legislature were to abolish the pay- 
ment of tithes, and what would be the consequence ? 
The foundations of all real property in the kingdom 
would be shaken. Would the farmers, who are goaded 
on to oppose the payment of tithe, be relieved ? Is it 
not clear that what he now pays in tithes, would be 
added to the demand made on him in the shape of rent ? 
Does not a farm which is let tithe free, bear a propor- 
tionably greater rent ? Who then would be benefited 
but the landlord ? By giving him, by the abolition of 
tithe, a property to which he never had a legal and just 
right, instead of relieving the community at large, you 
give him the means of increasing his rental, and that by 
sacrilegious abstraction of property from ecclesiastics, 
whose title to it is, beyond all comparison, the most an- 
cient title to property now known ! 

What would be thought and said by dissenters, of 
churchmen, or of the legislature, should they recom- 
mend or require, that relief should be granted to the 
consciences of those who are leaseholders under the en- 
dowment of some dissenting institution, by releasing 
them from the necessity of paying their rent, because 
they regard dissent as an evil, and dissenting churches 
anti- scriptural and anti- evangelical ! Would not the 
country ring from one end to the other with the indig- 
nant cry of, Injustice and spoliation ? And yet, would 
not the principle contended for be as good and as just 
in the one case as in the other ? Would dissenters, by 
submitting quietly to the loss of their many and great 
endowments, acquiesce in such a concession to the con- 
scientious scruples of those, who, though in many in- 
stances they happen not to belong to their community, 
have to pay them ? I state a case for the sake of an il- 
lustration of the injustice of the plea of conscience in 
reference to the payment of tithe to the Church of Eng- 
land by a dissenter. 

A. is the owner of an estate which has become his by 
T 2 



210 



inheritance or by purchase, and which is subjected to 
the payment of £50. per annum to a dissenting chapel 
for the support of its minister. A, the present owner of 
the estate, happens to be a churchman ; he says, " I am 
from principle a member of the Church of England ; I 
regard dissent as a great national evil, as an obstacle to 
the progress of truth and godliness in the land ; to 
compel me, then, to pay the £50. per annum with which 
my estate is chargeable in support of dissent, is to force 
me to violate my conscience — this is an outrage on 
righteous government and manly feeling — I will try and 
shake it off." Might not the dissenting minister reply, 
" Friend, in exacting this payment from you, I do you 
no wrong, I offer no violence to your conscience ; the 
payment is no evidence of your submission to the opi- 
nions of dissenters, but the performance of a legal and 
Christian duty of ( rendering to all their dues.' You 
know that the estate became yours subject to the pay- 
ment of which you complain ; you cannot on any one 
principle of equity, as an honest man, or as a Christian, 
object to pay it." Let the dissenter apply this illustra- 
tion to himself, and then say whether the plea of con- 
science in his own case will hold good ? 

Though these remarks have extended far beyond the 
length intended, I cannot close them without some no- 
tice of two pamphlets on the subject of tithes, published 
by " the Ecclesiaotical Knowledge Society." They are 
attributed to the pen of Dr. Bennett, a leading member 
of that society. At one of its anniversary meetings, the 
chairman, John Wilks, Esq., M P., informed the audi- 
ence, that he had handed the publications in question 
to Daniel O'Connell, Esq., M.P., the Irish Agitator, who 
expressed himself well pleased with them. The Agita- 
tor's approbation of them will not be questioned, when 
the reader has perused the following passage extracted 
from No. 18 : — 

" It is estimated, that the property in the hands of 
the Established Church, amounts to more than two 
hundred millions of absolute value. By the appropria- 
tion of this to national use, more than seven millions 



211 



annually would be saved on the score of interest; so 
much of the national debt might thus be liquidated as 
to afford an opportunity of borrowing the remainder in 
a two per cent, fund, &c. How have we been hoodwinked 
by the clergy, and by that unnatural fiction of the union 
of Church and State ! " 

Any comment on the above passage is unnecessary. 
Its revolutionary character and tendency must strike 
every candid reader. Well might O'Connell express his 
approbation of the tract on tithes ! 



THE END. 



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